
4 O 
A 






0^ 



^^0^ 



^0^ 










^r^ 








Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive 
in 2011 witii funding from 
Tine Library of Congress 



littp://www.arcliive.org/details/victoryatseaOOsims 



THE VICTORY 
AT SEA 



THE VICTORY 
AT SEA 

BY 

REAR-ADMIRAL WILLIAM SOWDEN SIMS 
U. S. NAVY 

COMMANDER OF THE AMERICAN NAVAL FORCES 

OPERATING IN EUROPEAN WATERS 

DURING THE GREAT WAR 

IN COLLABORATION WITH 

BURTON J. HENDRICK 




GARDEN CITY 

DOUBLEDAY, 



PAGE 
1920 



& 



NEW YORK 

COMPANY 






^\yr^ ^ 



: 2t o( e<:| a 






COPYRIGHT, 1919, 1920, BY 

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION 

INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN 






TO 

THE GALLANT OFFICERS AND MEN 

WHOM I HAD THE HONOR TO COMMAND 

DURING THE GREAT WAR 

IN 

GRATEFUL RECOGNITION OF 

A LOYAL DEVOTION TO THE CAUSE 

THAT GREATLY LIGHTENED THE 

RESPONSIBILITY 

BORNE BY 

"THE OLD MAN" 



PREFACE 

THIS is not in any sense a history of the operations 
of our naval forces in Europe during the Great War, 
much less a history of the naval operations as a whole. 
That would require not only many volumes, but prolonged 
and careful research by competent historians. When such 
a work is completed, our people will realize for the first time 
the admirable initiative with which the gallant personnel 
of our navy responded to the requirements of an unpre- 
cedented naval situation. 

But in the meantime this story has been written in re- 
sponse to a demand for some account of the very generally 
misunderstood submarine campaign and, particularly, of 
the means by which it was defeated. The interest of the 
public in such a story is due to the fact that during the war 
the sea forces were compelled to take all possible precautions 
to keep the enemy from learning anything about the various 
devices and means used to oppose or destroy the underwater 
craft. This necessity for the utmost secrecy was owing to the 
peculiar nature of the sea warfare. When the armies first 
made use of airplane bombs, or poison gas, or tanks, or mobile 
railroad batteries, the existence of these weapons and the 
manner of their use were necessarily at once revealed to the 
enemy, and the press was permitted to publish full accounts 
of them and, to a certain extent, of their effect and the 
means used to oppose them. Moreover, all general move- 
ments of the contending armies that resulted in engage- 
ments were known with fair accuracy on both sides within 

ix. 



x^ PREFACE 

a short time after they occurred and were promptly reported 
to an anxious pubHc. 

But this situation bore almost no resemblance to the 
struggle between the U-boats and the anti-submarine forces 
of the Allies. Barring a few naval actions between surface 
vessels, such as the battles of Jutland and of the Falkland 
Islands, the naval war was, for the most part, a succession of 
contests between single vessels or small groups of vessels. 
The enemy submarines sought to win the war by sinking the 
merchant shipping upon which depended the essential sup- 
plies of the allied populations and armies; and it was the 
effort of the Allies to prevent this, and to destroy submarines 
when possible, that constituted the vitally important naval 
activities of the war. By means of strategical and tactical 
dispositions, and various weapons and devices, now no longer 
secret, such as the depth charge, the mystery ship, hydro- 
phones, mine fields, explosive mine nets, special hunting 
submarines, and so forth, it was frequently possible either to 
destroy submarines with their entire crews, or to capture the 
few men who escaped when their boats were sunk, and thus 
keep from the German Admiralty all knowledge of the means 
by which their U-boats had met their fate. Thus the 
mystery ships, or decoy ships, as the Germans called them, 
destroyed a number of submarines before the enemy knew 
that such dangerous vessels existed. And even after they 
had acquired this knowledge, the mystery ships used various 
devices that enabled them to continue their successes until 
some unsuccessfully attacked submarine carried word of the 
new danger back to her home port. 

Under such unprecedented conditions of warfare, it is 
apparent that the Allied navies could not safely tell the pub- 
lic just what they were doing or how they were doing it. All 
articles written for the press had to be carefully censored, 
and all of these interesting matters ruthlessly suppressed; 
but now that the ban has been removed, it is desirable to give 
the relatives and friends of the fine chaps who did the good 



PREFACE . XI 

work sufficient information to enable them to understand 
the difficulty of the problem that was presented to the anti- 
submarine forces of the Allies, the manner in which it was 
solved, and the various means invented and employed. 

The subject is of course largely technical, but an effort 
has been made to present the story in such form that the 
layman can readily understand it. As it is difficult, if not 
quite impossible, for a naval officer to determine just which of 
the details that are a part of his daily life, and what in- 
cidents of sea experience would interest his civilian friends, 
the story has been written in collaboration with Mr. Burton 
J. Hendrick, to whom I am greatly indebted for invaluable 
assistance; and who, being an experienced hand at this writ- 
ing business, deserves all the credit the reader may be dis- 
posed to accord him for both the form and such graces of 
descriptive style as he may be able to detect. 

While opinions may differ to a certain extent as to the 
influence exerted upon the campaign by the various forms 
of tactics, the means and weapons employed, and the general 
strategy adopted, I have given what 1 believe to be a con- 
sensus of the best informed opinion upon these matters; and 
I have taken advantage of all of the information now availa- 
ble to insure accuracy in the account of the conditions that 
confronted the European naval forces, and in the description 
of the various operations that have been selected as typical 
examples of this very extraordinary warfare. 

It is probably unnecessary to add that this book is 
published with the full approval of the Navy Department. 
My correspondence on this subject with the Secretary will 
be found in the Appendix. 

w. s. s. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. When Germany Was Winning the War . 3 

II. The Return OF THE Mayflower .... 50 

III. The Adoption OF the Convoy .... 88 

IV. American Destroyers IN Action . . . . 118 
V. Decoying Submarines to Destruction . . 168 

VI. American College Boys and Subchasers . 198 

VII. The London Flagship 240 

VIII. Submarine Against Submarine .... 263 

IX. The American Mine Barrage in the North 

Sea 285 

X. German Submarines Visit the American 

Coast - 310 

XI. Fighting Submarines from the Air . . . 320 

XII. The Navy Fighting on the Land . . . 336 

XIII. Transporting Two Million American 

Soldiers to France ...... 342 

Appendix 369 

Index . 403 



THE VICTORY 
AT SEA 



THE VICTORY AT SEA 

CHAPTER I 

WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 
THE WAR 

I 

IN THE latter part of March, 19 17, a message from the 
Navy Department came to me at Newport, where I was 
stationed as president of the Naval War College, sum- 
moning me immediately to Washington. The inter- 
national atmosphere at that time was extremely tense, and 
the form in which these instructions were cast showed 
that something extraordinary was impending. The orders 
directed me to make my visit as unostentatious as possible; to 
keep all my movements secret, and, on my arrival in 
Washington, not to appear at the Navy Department, but 
to telephone headquarters. I promptly complied with these 
orders; and, after I got in touch with the navy chiefs, it 
took but a few moments to explain the situation- It seemed 
inevitable, I was informed, that the United States would 
soon be at war with Germany. Ambassador Page had 
cabled that it would be desirable, under the existing cir- 
cumstances, that the American navy be represented by 
an officer of higher rank than any of those who were 
stationed in London at that time. The Department there- 
fore wished me to leave immediately for England, to get in 
touch with the British Admiralty, to study the naval situa- 
tion and learn how we could best and most quickly cooperate 
in the naval war. At this moment we were still technically 
at peace with Germany. Mr. Daniels, the Secretary of the 



4 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Navy, therefore thought it wise that there should be no 
publicity about my movements. I was to remain osten- 
sibly as head of the War College, and, in order that no 
suspicions should be aroused, my wife and family were still 
to occupy the official residence of its president. I was directed 
to sail on a merchant vessel, to travel under an assumed 
name, to wear civilian clothes and to take no uniform. On 
reaching the other side I was to get immediately in com- 
munication with the British Admiralty, and send to Wash- 
ington detailed reports on prevailing conditions. 

A few days after this interview in Washington two com- 
monplace looking gentlemen, dressed in civilian clothes, 
secretly boarded the American steamship New York. They 
were entered upon the passenger list as V. J. Richardson and 
S. W. Davidson. A day or two out an enterprising steward 
noticed that the initials on the pajamas of one of these pas- 
sengers differed from those of the name under which he was 
sailing and reported him to the captain as a suspicious 
character. The captain had a quiet laugh over this dis- 
covery, for he knew that Mr. Davidson was Rear-Admiral 
Sims, of the United States Navy, and that his companion 
who possessed the two sets of conflicting initials was 
Commander J. V. Babcock, the Admiral's aide. The 
voyage itself was an uneventful one, but a good deal of history 
was made in those few days that we spent upon the sea. 
Our ship reached England on April 9th; one week previously 
President Wilson had gone before Congress and asked for 
the declaration of a state of war with Germany. We had a 
slight reminder that a war was under way as we neared 
Liverpool, for a mine struck our vessel as we approached the 
outer harbor. The damage was not irreparable; the pas- 
sengers were transferred to another steamer and we safely 
reached port, where I found a representative of the British 
Admiralty, Rear-Admiral Hope, waiting to receive me. 
The Admiralty had also provided a special train, in which we 
left immediately for London. 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 5 

Whenever I think of the naval situation as it existed in 
April, 1917, I always have before my mind two contrasting 
pictures — one that of the British public, as represented in 
their press and in their social gatherings in London, and the 
other that of British officialdom, as represented in my con- 
fidential meetings with British statesmen and British naval 
officers. For the larger part the English newspapers were 
publishing optimistic statements about the German sub- 
marine campaign. In these they generally scouted the idea 
that this new form of piracy really threatened in any way the 
safety of the British Empire. They accompanied these 
rather cheerful outgivings by weekly statistics of submarine 
sinkings; figures which, while not particularly reassuring, 
hardly indicated that any serious inroads had yet been 
made on the British mercantile marine. The Admiralty 
was publishing tables showing that four or five thousand 
ships were arriving at British ports and leaving them every 
week, while other tables disclosed the number of British 
ships of less than sixteen hundred tons and more than 
sixteen hundred tons that were going down every seven days. 
Thus the week of my arrival I learned from these figures 
that Great Britain had lost seventeen ships above that size, 
and two ships below; that 2,406 vessels had arrived at 
British ports, that 2,367 had left, and that, in addition, 
seven fishing vessels had fallen victims to the German 
submarines. Such figures were worthless, for they did not 
include neutral ships and did not give the amount of tonnage 
sunk, details, of course, which it was necessary to keep from 
the enemy. The facts which the Government thus permitted 
to come to public knowledge did not indicate that the situa- 
tion was particularly alarming. Indeed the newspapers all 
over the British Isles showed no signs of perturbation; on the 
contrary, they were drawing favorable conclusions from 
these statistics. Here and there one of them may have 
sounded a more apprehensive note ; yet the generally prevail- 
ing feeling both in the press and in general discussions of the 



6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

war seemed to be that the submarine campaign had already 
failed, that Germany's last desperate attempt to win the 
war had already broken down, and that peace would probably 
not be long delayed. The newspapers found considerable 
satisfaction in the fact that the "volume of British shipping 
was being maintained"; they displayed such headlines as 
"improvement continues"; they printed prominently the en- 
couraging speeches of certain British statesmen, and in this 
way were apparently quieting popular apprehension concern- 
ing the outcome. This same atmosphere of cheerful ignor- 
ance I found everywhere in London society. The fear of 
German submarines was not disturbing the London season, 
which had now reached its height ; the theatres were packed 
every night ; everywhere, indeed, the men and women of the 
upper classes were apparently giving little thought to any 
danger that might be hanging over their country. Before 
arriving in England I myself had not known the gravity of the 
situation. I had followed the war from the beginning with 
the greatest interest; I had read practically everything 
printed about it in the American and foreign press, and I had 
had access to such official information as was available on 
our side of the Atlantic. The result was that, when I sailed 
for England in March, I felt little fear about the outcome. 
All the fundamental facts in the case made it appear im- 
possible that the Germans could win the war. Sea power 
apparently rested practically unchallenged in the hands of 
the Allies; and that in itself, according to the unvarying les-^ 
sons of history, was an absolute assurance of ultimate victory. 
The statistics of shipping losses had been regularly printed 
in the American press, and, while such wanton destruction 
of life and property seemed appalling, there was apparently 
nothing in these figures that was likely to make any material 
change in the result. Indeed it appeared to be altogether 
probable that the war would end before the United States 
could exert any material influence upon the outcome. My 
conclusions were shared by most American naval officers 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 7 

whom I knew, students of warfare, who, like myself, had the 
utmost respect for the British fleet and believed that it had 
the naval situation well in hand. 

Yet a few days spent in London clearly showed that all 
this confidence in the defeat of the Germans rested upon a 
misapprehension. The Germans, it now appeared, were not 
losing the war — they were winning it. The British Admir- 
alty now placed before the American representative facts 
and figures which it had not given to the British press. These 
documents disclosed the astounding fact that, unless the 
appalling destruction of merchant tonnage which was then 
taking place could be materially checked, the unconditional 
surrender of the British Empire would inevitably take place 
within a few months. 

On the day of my arrival in London I had my first inter- 
view with Admiral Jellicoe, who was at that time the First 
Sea Lord. Admiral Jellicoe and I needed no introduction. 
I had known him for many years and for a considerable 
period we had been more or less regular correspondents. 
I had first made his acquaintance in China in 1901 ; at that 
time Jellicoe was a captain and was already recognized as 
one of the coming men of the British navy. He was an 
expert in ordnance and gunnery, a subject in which I was 
greatly interested; and this fact had brought us together and 
made us friends. The admiration which I had then con- 
ceived for the Admiral's character and intelligence I have 
never lost. He was then, as he has been ever since, an 
indefatigable worker, and more than a worker, for he was a 
profound student of everything which pertained to ships 
and gunnery, and a man who joined to a splendid intellect 
the real ability of command. I had known him in his own 
home with his wife and babies, as well as on shipboard among 
his men, and had observed at close hand the gracious per- 
sonality which had the power to draw everyone to him and 
make him the idol both of his own children and the officers 
and jackies of the British fleet. Simplicity and directness 



8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

were his two most outstanding points; though few men had 
risen so rapidly in the Royal Navy, success had made him 
only more quiet, soft spoken, and unostentatiously dignified; 
there was nothing of the blustering seadog about the Ad- 
miral, but he was all courtesy, all brain, and, of all the men 
I have ever met, there have been none more approachable, 
more frank, and more open-minded. 

Physically Admiral Jellicoe is a small man, but as powerful 
in frame as he is in mind, and there are few men in the navy 
who can match him in tennis. His smooth-shaven face, 
when I met him that morning in April, 19 17, was, as usual, 
calm, smiling, and imperturbable. One could never divine 
his thoughts by any outward display of emotion. Neither 
did he give any signs that he was bearing a great burden, 
though it is not too much ta say that at this moment the 
safety of the British Empire rested chiefly upon Admiral 
Jellicoe's shoulders. I fmd the absurd notion prevalent in 
this country that his change from Commander of the Grand 
Fleet to First Sea Lord was something in the nature of a 
demotion; but nothing could be farther from the truth. As 
First Sea Lord, Jellicoe controlled the operations, not only 
of the Grand Fleet, but also of the entire British navy; he 
had no superior officer, for the First Lord of the Admiralty, 
the position in England that corresponds to our Secretary 
of the Navy, has no power to give any order whatever to 
the fleet — a power which our Secretary possesses. Thus the 
defeat of the German submarines was a direct responsibility 
which Admiral Jellicoe could divide with no other official. 
Great as this duty was, and appalling as was the submarine 
situation at the time of this interview, there was nothing 
about the Admiral's bearing which betrayed any depression 
of spirits. He manifested great seriousness indeed, possibly 
some apprehension, but British stoicism and the usual 
British refusal to succumb to discouragement were qualities 
that were keeping him tenaciously at his job. 

After the usual greetings, Admiral Jellicoe took a paper 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 9 

out of his drawer and handed it to me. It was a record of 
tonnage losses for the last few months. This showed that 
the total sinkings, British and neutral, had reached 536,000 
tons in February and 603,000 in March; it further disclosed 
that sinkings were taking place in April which indicated 
the destruction of nearly 900,000 tons. These figures in- 
dicated that the losses were three and four times as large as 
those which were then being published in the press.* 

It is expressing it mildly to say that I was surprised by this 
disclosure. I was fairly astounded ; for I had never imagined 
anything so terrible. I expressed my consternation to 
Admiral Jellicoe. 

"Yes," he said, as quietly as though he were discussing 
the weather and not the future of the British Empire. " It 
is impossible for us to go on with the war if losses like this 
continue." 

"What are you doing about it?" I asked. 

"Everything that we can. We are increasing our anti- 
submarine forces in every possible way. We are using every 
possible craft we can fmd with which to fight submarines. 
We are building destroyers, trawlers, and other like craft 
as fast as we can. But the situation is very serious and we 
shall need all of the assistance we can get." 

"It looks as though the Germans were winning the war," 
I remarked. 

"They will win, unless we can stop these losses — and stop 
them soon," the Admiral replied. 

"Is there no solution for the problem?" I asked. 

"Absolutely none that we can see now," Jellicoe an- 
nounced. He described the work of destroyers and other 
anti-submarine craft, but he showed no confidence that they 
would be able to control the depredations of the U-boats. 

The newspapers for several months had been publishing 

*The statements published were not false, but they were inconclusive and inten- 
tionally so. They gave the number of British ships sunk, but not their tonnage, 
and not the total losses of British, Allied, and neutral tonnage. 



lo THE VICTORY AT SEA 

stories that submarines in large numbers were being sunk; 
and these stories I now found to be untrue. The Admiralty 
records showed that only fifty-four German submarines were 
positively known to have been sunk since the beginning of 
the war; the German shipyards, I was now informed, were 
turning out new submarines at the rate of three a week. 
The newspapers had also published accounts of the voluntary 
surrender of German U-boats; but not one such surrender. 
Admiral Jellicoe said, had ever taken place; the stories had 
been circulated merely for the purpose of depreciating enemy 
morale. 1 even found that members of the government, all 
of whom should have been better informed, and also British 
naval officers, believed that many captured German sub- 
marines had been carefully stowed away at the Portsmouth 
and Plymouth navy yards. Yet the disconcerting facts 
which faced the Allies were that the supplies and communica- 
tions of the forces on all fronts were threatened; that Ger- 
man submarines were constantly extending their operations 
farther and farther out into the Atlantic; that German 
raiders were escaping into the open sea; that three years' 
constant operations had seriously threatened the strength 
of the British navy, and that Great Britain's control of the 
sea was actually at stake. Nor did Admiral Jellicoe indulge 
in any false expectations concerning the future. Bad as the 
situation then was, he had every expectation that it would 
grow worse. The season which was now approaching would 
make easier the German operations, for the submarines 
would soon have the long daylight of the British summer 
and the more favorable weather. The next few months, 
indeed, both in the estimation of the Germans and the 
British, would witness the great crisis of the war; the basis of 
the ruthless campaign upon which the submarines had 
entered was that they could reach the decision before winter 
closed in. So far as I could learn there was a general belief 
in British naval circles that this plan would succeed. The 
losses were now approaching a million tons a month; it was 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING ii 

thus a matter of very simple arithmetic to determine the 
length of time the Allies could stand such a strain. Accord- 
ing to the authorities the limit of endurance would be 
reached about November i, 191 7; in other words, unless 
some method of successfully fighting submarines could be 
discovered almost immediately, Great Britain would have 
to lay down her arms before a victorious Germany. 

"What we are facing is the defeat of Great Britain," said 
Ambassador Walter H. Page, after the situation had been 
explained to him. 

In the next few weeks I had many interviews with Ad- 
miral Jellicoe and other members of the Admiralty. Sitting 
in conference with them every morning, I became, for all 
practical purposes, a member of their organization. There 
were no secrets of the British navy which were not disclosed 
to their new American ally. This policy was in accordance 
with the broad-minded attitude of the British Government; 
there was a general desire that the United States should 
understand the situation'completely, and from the beginning 
rqatters were discussed with the utmost frankness. Every- 
where was manifested a willingness to receive suggestions 
and to try any expedient that promised to be even remotely 
successful ; yet the feeling prevailed that there was no quick 
and easy way to defeat the submarine, that anything even 
faintly resembling the much-sought "answer" had not 
yet appeared on th^ horizon. The prevailing impression ,^, 
that any new invention could control the submarine in time 
to be effective was deprecated. The American press was at 
that time constantly calling upon Edison and other great 
American inventors to solve this problem, and, in fact, in- 
ventors in every part of two hemispheres were turning out 
devices by the thousands. A regular department of the , 
Admiralty which was headed by Admiral Fisher had charge 
of investigating their proposals; in a few months it had 
received and examined not far from 40,000 inventions, none 
of which answered the purpose,. though many of them were 



12 



THE VICTORY AT SEA 



exceedingly ingenious. British naval officers were not hostile 
to such projects ; they declared, however, that it would be 
absurd to depend upon new devices for defeating the German 
campaign. The over-shadowing fact — a fact which I find 
that many naval men have not yet sufficiently grasped — is 
that time was the all-important element. It was necessary 
not only that a way be l^found of curbing the submarine, 
but of accomplishing this result at once. The salvation of 
the great cause in which we had engaged was a matter 

of only a few months. A 
mechanical device, or a new 
type of ship which might 
destroy this menace six 
months hence, would not 
have helped us, for by that 
time Germany would have 
won the war. 

I discussed the situation 
also with members of the 
Cabinet, such as Mr. Bal- 
four, Lord Robert Cecil, 
and Sir Edward Carson. 




THE SHIPS SUNK IN APRIL, 1917 
When America entered the war the submarine was a growing menace that threat- 
ened to annihilate Britain's merchant fleet in a very few months if the rate of 
sinking was kept up. Each dot represents a ship destroyed by the U-boats. 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 13 

Their attitude to me was very diflPerent from the attitude 
which they were taking publicly; these men naturally would 
say nothing in the newspapers that would improve the 
enemy morale; but in explaining the situation to me they 
repeated practically everything that Jellicoe had said. It 
was the seriousness of this situation that soon afterward 
sent Mr. Balfour and the British Commission to the United 
States. The world does not yet understand what a dark 
moment that was in the history of the Allied cause. Not 

only were the German sub- 
marines sweeping British com- 
merce from the seas, but the 
German armies were also de- 
feating the British and French 
on the battlefields in France. 
It is only when we recall that 
the Germans were attaining 
the high peak of success with 
the U-boats at the very mo- 
ment that General Nivelle's 
offensive had failed on the 
Western Front that we can 




AND THOSE LOST IN APRIL, 1918 
One year after America's entrance into the war the submarine had been mas- 
tered by the Anglo-American navies, and although still a danger was no longer 
threatening Allied control of the seas. 



14 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

get some idea of the real tragedy of the Allied situation in 
the spring of 19 17. 

"Things were dark when I took that trip to America,'* 
Mr. Balfour said to me afterward. "The submarines were 
constantly on my mind. I could think of nothing but the 
number of ships which they were sinking. At that time it 
certainly looked as though we were going to lose the war." 

One of the men who most keenly realized the state of 
affairs was the King. I met His Majesty first in the vestibule 
of St. Paul's, on that memorable occasion in April, 19 17, 
when the English people held a thanksgiving service to com- 
memorate America's entrance into the war. Then, as at 
several subsequent meetings, the King impressed me as a 
simple, courteous, unaffected English gentleman. He was 
dressed in khaki, like any other English officer, and his 
manner was warm hearted, sincere, and even democratic. 

"It gives me great pleasure to meet you on an occasion 
like this," said His Majesty, referring to the great Anglo- 
American memorial service. "I am also glad to greet an 
American admiral on such a mission as yours. And I wish 
you all success." 

On that occasion we naturally had little time to discuss 
the submarines, but a few days afterward I was invited to 
spend the night at Windsor Castle. The King in his own 
home proved to be even more cordial, if that were possible, 
than at oiir first meeting. After dinner we adjourned to a 
small room and there, over our cigars, we discussed the 
situation at considerable length. The King is a rapid and 
animated talker; he was kept constantly informed on the 
submarine situation, and discussed it that night in all its 
details. I was at first surprised by his familiarity with all 
naval questions and the intimate touch which he was evi- 
dently maintaining with the British fleet. Yet this was not 
really surprising, for His Majesty himself is a sailor; in his 
early youth he joined the navy, in which he worked up like 
any other British boy. He seemed almost as well informed 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 15 

about the American navy as about the British; he dis- 
played the utmost interest' in our preparations on land and 
sea, and he was particularly solicitous that I, as the American 
representative, should have complete access to the Ad- 
miralty Office. About the submarine campaign, the King 
was just as outspoken as Jellicoe and the other members of 
the Admiralty. The thing must be stopped, or the Allies 
could never win the war. 

Of all the influential men in British public life there was 
only one who at that time took an optimistic attitude. This 
was Mr. Lloyd George. I met the Prime Minister frequently 
at dinners, at his own country place and elsewhere, and the 
most lasting impression which I retain of this wonderful man 
was his irrepressible gaiety of spirits. I think of the Prime 
Minister of Great Britain as a great, big, exuberant boy, 
always laughing and joking, constantly indulging in re- 
partee and by-play, and even in this crisis, perhaps the 
darkest one of British history, showing no signs of depres- 
sion. His face, which was clear in its complexion as a girl's, 
never betrayed the slightest anxiety, and his eyes, which were 
always sparkling, never disclosed the faintest shadow. It 
was a picture which I shall never forget — that of this man, 
upon whose shoulders the destiny of the Empire chiefly 
rested, apparently refusing to admit, even to himself, the 
dangers that were seemingly overwhelming it, heroically 
devoting all his energies to uplifting the spirits of his coun- 
trymen, and, in his private intercourse with his associates, 
even in the most fateful moments, finding time to tell funny 
stories, to recall entertaining anecdotes of his own political 
career, to poke fun at the mistakes of his opponents, and to 
turn the general conversation a thousand miles away from 
the Western Front and the German submarines. It was the 
most inspiring instance of self-control that I have ever 
known; indeed only one other case in history can be com- 
pared with it; Lloyd George's attitude at this period con- 
stantly reminded me of Lincoln in the darkest hours of the 



i6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Civil War, when, after receiving news of such calamities 
as Fredericksburg or Chancellorsville, he would entertain 
his cabinet by reading selections from Artemus Ward, inter- 
larded with humorous sayings and anecdotes of his own. 
Perhaps Lloyd George's cheerfulness is explained by another 
trait which he likewise possessed in common with Lincoln; 
there is a Welsh mysticism in his nature which, I am told, 
sometimes takes the form of religious exaltation. Lloyd 
George's faith in God and in a divine ordering of history was 
evidently so profound that the idea of German victory 
probably never seized his mind as a reality; we all know that 
Lincoln's absolute confidence in the triumph of the North 
rested upon a similar basis. Certainly only some such deep- 
set conviction as this could explain Lloyd George's serenity 
and optimism in the face of the most frightful calamities. 
I attended a small dinner at which the Premier was present 
four days after the Germans had made their terrible attack 
in March, 19 18. Even on this occasion he showed no 
evidences of strain; as usual his animated spirits held the 
upper hand; he was talking incessantly, but he never even 
mentioned the subject that was absorbing the thoughts of 
the rest of the world at that moment; instead he rattled 
along, touching upon the Irish question, discussing the im- 
pression which Irish conscription would make in America, 
and, now and then, pausing to pass some bantering remark 
to Mr. Balfour. This was the way that 1 always saw the 
head of the British Government; never did I meet him when 
he was fagged or discouraged, or when he saw any end to the 
war but a favorable one. 

On several occasions I attempted to impress Mr. Lloyd 
George with the gravity of the situation ; he always refused 
to acknowledge that it was grave. 

"Oh, yes, things are bad," he would say with a smile and a 
sweep of his hand. " But we shall get the best of the sub- 
marines—never fear!" 

The cheerfulness of the Prime Minister, however, was ex- 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 17 

ceptional; all his associates hardly concealed their appre- 
hension. On the other hand, a wave of enthusiasm was at 
that time sweeping over Germany. Americans still have 
an idea that the German Government adopted the sub- 
marine campaign as the last despairing gambler's chance, 
and that they only half believed in its success themselves. 
There is an impression here that the Germans never would 
have staked their Empire on this desperate final throw had 
they foreseen that the United States would have mobilized 
against them all its men and resources. This conviction is 
entirely wrong. The Germans did not think that they were 
taking any chances when they announced their unrestricted 
campaign; the ultimate result seemed to them to be a cer- 
tainty. They calculated the available shipping which the 
Allies and the neutral nations had afloat ; they knew just how 
many ships their submarines could sink every month, and 
from these statistics they mathematically deduced, with real 
German precision, the moment when the war would end. 
They did not like the idea of adding the United States to 
their enemies, but this was because they were thinking of 
conditions after the war; for they would have preferred to have 
had American friendship in the period of readjustment. But 
they did not fear that we could do them much injury in the 
course of the war itself. This again was not because they 
really despised our fighting power; they knew that we would 
prove a formidable enemy on the battlefield ; but the obvious 
fact, to their eyes, was that our armies could never get to the 
front in time. The submarine campaign, they said, would 
finish the thing in three or four months; and certainly in that 
period the unprepared United States could never summon 
any military power that could affect the result. Thus from 
a purely military standpoint the entrance of 100,000,000 
Americans afi'ected them about as much as would a declara- 
tion of war from the planet Mars. 

We confirmed this point of view from the commanders of 
the occasionally captured submarines. These men would be 



i8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

brought to London and questioned; they showed the utmost 
confidence in the result. 

"Yes, you've got us," they would say, "but what differ- 
ence does that make? There are plenty more submarines 
coming out. You will get a few, but we can build a dozen 
for every one that you can capture or sink. Anyway, the 
war will all be over in two or three months and we shall be 
sent back home." 

All these captives laughed at the merest suggestion of 
German defeat; their attitude was not that of prisoners, but 
of conquerors. They also regarded themselves as heroes, 
and they gloried in the achievements of their submarine 
service. For the most part they exaggerated the sinkings 
and estimated that the war would end about the first of 
July or August. Similarly the Berlin Government exag- 
gerated the extent of their success. This was not surprising, 
for one peculiarity of the submarine is that only the com- 
mander, stationed at the periscope, knows what is going 
on. He can report sinking a 5,000 ton ship and no one can 
contradict his statement, for the crew and the other officers 
do not see the surface of the water. Not unnaturally the 
commander does not depreciate his own achievements, and 
thus the amount of sunken tonnage reported in Berlin con- 
siderably exceeded the actual losses. 

The speeches of German dignitaries resounded with the 
same confidence. 

"In the impending decisive battle," said the Kaiser, "the 
task falls upon my navy of turning the English war method 
of starvation, with which our most hated and most obstinate 
enemy intends to overthrow the German people, against 
him and his allies by combating their sea traffic with all the 
means in our power. In this work the submarine will stand 
in the first rank. I expect that this weapon, technically 
developed with wise forethought at our admirable yards, in 
cooperation with all our other naval fighting weapons and 
supported by the spirit which, during the whole course of the 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING ig 

war, has enabled us to perform brilliant deeds, will break 
our enemy's war will." 

" In this life and death struggle by hunger," said Dr. 
Karl Helfferich, Imperial Secretary of the Interior, "England 
believed herself to be far beyond the reach of any anxiety 
about food. A year ago it was supposed that England would 
be able to use the acres of the whole world, bidding with 
them against the German acres. To-day England sees her- 
self in a situation unparalleled in her history. Her acres 
across sea disappear as a result of the blockade which our 
submarines are daily making more elTective around England. 
We have considered, we have dared. Certain of the result, 
we shall not allow it to be taken from us by anybody or 
anything." 

These statements now read almost like ancient history, 
yet they were made in February, 19 17. At that time, Ameri- 
cans and Englishmen read them with a smile; they seemed 
to be the kind of German rodomontade with which the war 
had made us so familiar; they seemed to be empty mouth- 
ings put out to bolster up the drooping German spirit. That 
the Kaiser and his advisers could really believe such rubbish 
was generally regarded as absurd. Yet not only did they 
believe what they were saying but, as already explained, 
they also had every reason for believing it. The Kaiser and 
his associates had figured that the war would end about 
July I St or August ist; and English officials with whom I 
came in contact placed the date at November ist — always 
provided, of course, that no method were found for checking 
the submarine.* 

II 

HOW, then, could we defeat the submarine? Before ap- 
proaching this subject, it is well to understand precisely 
what was taking place in the spring and summer of 19 17 in 
those waters surrounding the British Isles. What was this 

*See appendices 1 1 and III for my cable and letter to the Navy Department, ex- 
plaining the submarine situation in detail. 



20 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

strange new type of warfare that was bringing the Allied 
cause to its knees? Nothing like it had ever been known 
in recorded time; nothing like it had been foreseen when, on 
August 3, 19 1 4, the British Government threw all its re- 
sources and all its people against the great enemy of man- 
kind. 

Leaving entirely out of consideration international law and 
humanity, it must be admitted that strategically the German 
submarine campaign was well conceived. Its purpose was 
to marshal on the German side that force which has always 
proved to be the determining one in great international 
conflicts — sea power. The advantages which the control 
of the sea gives the nation which possesses it are apparent. 
In the first place, it makes secure such a nation's communica- 
tions with the outside world and its own allies, and, at the 
same time, it cuts the communications of its enemy. It 
enables the nation dominant at sea to levy upon the re- 
sources of the entire world; to obtain food for its civilian 
population, raw materials for its manufactures, munitions 
for its armies; and, at the same time, to maintain that com- 
merce upon which its very economic life may depend. It 
enables such a power also to transport troops into any field 
of action where they may be required. At the very time 
that sea power is heaping all these blessings upon the domi- 
nant nation, it enables such a nation to deny these same 
advantages to its enemy. For the second great resource 
of sea power is the blockade. If the enemy is agriculturally 
and industrially dependent upon the outside world, sea power 
can transform it into a beleaguered fortress and sooner or 
later compel its unconditional surrender. Its operations 
are not spectacular, but they work with the inevitable re- 
morselessness of death itself. 

This fact is so familiar that I insist upon it here only for 
the purpose of inviting attention to another fact which is not 
so apparent. Perhaps the greatest commonplace of the war, 
from the newspaper standpoint, was that the British fleet 



WHEN GERMANY WASWINNING 21 

controlled the seas. This mere circumstance, as I have al- 
ready said, was the reason why all students of history were 
firm in their belief that she could never be defeated. It was 
not until the spring of 19 17 that we really awoke to the actual 
situation; it was not until I had spent several days in England 
that I made the all-important discovery, which was this — 
that Britain did not control the seas. She still controlled 
the seas in the old Nelsonian sense; that is, her Grand Fleet 
successfully "contained" the German battle squadrons and 
kept them, for the greater part of the war, penned up in their 
German harbors. In the old days such a display of sea 
power would have easily won the war for the Allies. But 
that is not control of the seas in the modern sense; it is 
merely control of the surface of the seas. Under modern 
methods of naval warfare sea control means far more than 
controlling the top of the water. For there is another type 
of ship, which sails stealthily under the waves, revealing 
its presence only at certain intervals, and capable of shoot- 
ing a terrible weapon which can sink the proudest surface 
ship in a few minutes. The existence of this new type of 
warship makes control of the seas to-day a very different 
thing from what it was in Nelson's time. As long as such a 
warship can operate under the water almost at will — and 
this was the case in a considerable area of the ocean in 
the early part of 19 17 — it is ridiculous to say that any navy 
controls the seas. For this subsurface vessel, when used 
as, successfully as it was used by the Germans in 191 7, de- 
prives the surface navy of that advantage which has proved 
most 'decisive in other wars. That is, the surface navy can 
no longer completely protect communications as it could 
protect them in Nelson's and Farragut's times. It no longer 
guarantees a belligerent its food, its munitions, its raw 
materials of manufacture and commerce, or the free move- 
ment of its troops. It is obviously absurd to say that a 
belligerent which was losing 800,000 or 900,000 tons of ship- 
ping a month, as was the case with the Allies in the spring of 



22 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

19 1 7, was the undisputed mistress of the seas. Had the 
German submarine campaign continued to succeed at this 
rate, the United States could not have transported its army 
to France, and the food and materials which we were sending 
to Europe, and which were essential to winning the war, 
could never have crossed the ocean. 

That is to say, complete control of the subsurface by 
Germany would have turned against England the blockade, 
the very power with which she had planned to reduce the 
German Empire. Instead of isolating Germany from the 
rest of the world, she would herself be isolated. 

In due course I shall attempt to show the immediate con- 
nection that exists between control of the surface and control 
of the subsurface; this narrative will disclose, indeed, that 
the nation which possesses the first also potentially possesses 
the second. In the early spring of 19 17, however, this 
principle was not effective, so far as merchant shipping was 
concerned. 

Germany's purpose in adopting the ruthless submarine 
warfare was, of course, the one which I have indicated: to 
deprive the Allied armies in the field, and their civilian popu- 
lations, of these supplies from overseas which were essential 
to victory. Nature had been kind to this German pro- 
gramme when she created the British Isles. Indeed this 
tight little kingdom and the waters which surround it 
provided an ideal field for operations of this character. For 
purposes of contrast, let us consider our own geographical 
situation. A glance at the map discloses that it would 
be almost impossible to blockade the United States with 
submarines. In the first place, the operation of submarines 
more than three thousand miles from their bases would pre- 
sent almost insuperable difficulties. That Germany could 
send an occasional submarine to our coasts she demonstrated 
in the war, but it would be hardly possible to maintain 
anything like a regular and persistent campaign. Even if 
she could have kept a force constantly engaged in our waters. 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 23 

other natural difficulties would have defeated their most 
determined efforts. The trade routes approach our At- 
lantic seacoast in the shape of a fan, of which different sticks 
point to such ports as Boston, New York, Philadelphia, 
Norfolk, and the ports of the Gulf of Mexico. To destroy 
shipping to American ports it would be necessary for the 
enemy to cover all these routes with submarines, a project 
which is so vast that it is hardly worth the trial. In addi- 
tion we have numerous Pacific ports to which we could divert 
shipping in case our enemy should attempt to blockade us 
on the Atlantic coast; our splendid system of transcon- 
tinental railroads would make internal distribution not a 
particularly difficult matter. Above all such consider- 
ations, of course, is the fact that the United States is an 
industrial and agricultural entity, self-supporting and self- 
feeding, and, therefore, it could not be starved into 
surrender even though the enemy should surmount these 
practically insuperable obstacles to a submarine blockade. 
But the situation of the British Isles is entirely different. 
They obtain from overseas the larger part of their food and 
a considerable part of their raw materials, and in April of 
19 1 7, according to reliable statements made at that time, 
England had enough food on hand for only six weeks or two 
months. The trade routes over which these supplies came 
made the submarine blockade a comparatively simple mat- 
ter. Instead of the sticks of a fan, the comparison which 
I have suggested with our own coast, we now have to deal 
with the neck of a bottle. The trade routes to our Atlantic 
coast spread out, as they approach our ports; on the other 
hand, the trade routes to Great Britain converge almost to 
a point. The far-flung steamship lanes which bring Britain 
her food and raw materials from half a dozen continents 
focus in the Irish Sea and the English Channel. To cut the 
communications of Great Britain, therefore, the submarines 
do not have to patrol two or three thousand miles of sea- 
coast, as would be necessary in the casfe of the United States; 



24 



THE VICTORY AT SEA 



they merely need to hover around the extremely restricted 
waters west and south of Ireland. 

This was precisely the area which the Germans had 
selected for their main field of activity. It was here that 
their so-called U-boats were operating with the most deadly 
effect ; these waters constituted their happy hunting grounds. 



Sc.ile of Miles 
12 3 4 5 

NORTH 


SEEBRUGG^r- 


k; 


SEA y/ 


'f'Y ■■'■■' 


, ■^' 


j^^S-X'EMt^. /.','{ 


^^:v\^ 


¥ 


<it^&.*.\. D««m»s (f(ij'*t«^?^^TOl||p(|j 


i^mw w'lifmSgrs^ 





THE SUBMARINE NEST 
The main base for the U-boats was the Belgian city of 
Bruges. From this point canals extended to Ostend and 
Zeebrugge, and thence the U-boats obtained access to the 
seas. They had two routes to the main hunting grounds 
off the west and south of Ireland. Some went around north 
of Scotland, while others went directly through the mine 
barrage that stretched across the English Channel. In 
April, 191 7, this barrage, contrary to the general belief, 
did not prevent the passage of the U-boats. It was not 
until 1918 that it successfully blocked them. 



for here came the great cargo ships, with food and supplies 
from America, which were bound for Liverpool and the 
great Channel ports. The submarines that did destruction 
in this region were the type that have gained universal fame 
as the U-boats. There were other types, which I shall 
describe, but the U-boats were the main reliance of the 
German navy; they were fairly large vessels, of about 800 
tons, and carried from eight to twelve torpedoes and enough 
fuel and supplies to keep the sea for three or four weeks. 
And here let me correct one universal misapprehension. 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 25 

These U-boats did not have bases off the Irish and Spanish 
coasts, as most people still believe. Such bases would have 
been of no particular use to them. The cruising period of a 
submarine did not depend, as is the prevailing impression, 
upon its supply of fuel oil and food, for almost any under- 
water boat was able to carry enough of these essential ma- 
terials for a practically indefinite period ; the average U-boat 
moreover, could easily make the voyage across the Atlantic 
and back. The cruising period depended upon its supply 
of torpedoes. A submarine returned to its base only after it 
had exhausted its supply of these destructive missiles; if it 
should shoot them all in twenty-four hours, then a single day 
would end that particular cruise; if the torpedoes lasted a 
month, then the submarine stayed out for that length of 
time. For these reasons bases on the Irish coast would 
have been useful only in case they could replenish the tor- 
pedoes, and this was obviously an impossibility. No, there 
was not the slightest mystery concerning the bases of the 
U-boats. V/hen the Germans captured the city of Bruges 
in Belgium they transformed it into a headquarters for sub- 
marines; here many of the U-boats were assembled, and here 
facilities were provided for docking, repairing, and supplying 
them. Bruges was thus one of the main headquarters for 
the destructive campaign which was waged against British 
commerce. Bruges itself is an inland town, but from it two 
canals extend, one to Ostend and the other to Zeebrugge, 
and in this way the interior submarine base formed the 
apex of a triangle. It was by way of these canals that the 
U-boats reached the open sea. 

Once in the English Channel, the submarines had their 
choice of two routes to the hunting grounds off the west and 
south of Ireland. A large number made the apparently 
unnecessarily long detour across the North Sea and around 
Scotland, going through the Fair Island Passage, between the 
Orkney and the Shetland islands, along the Hebrides, where 
they sometimes made a landfall, and so around the west 



26 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

coast of Ireland. This looks like a long and difficult trip, 
yet the time was not entirely wasted, for the U-boats, as the 
map of sinkings shows, usually destroyed several vessels 
on the way to their favorite hunting grounds. But there 
was another and shorter route to this area available to the 
U-boats. And here I must correct another widely prevailing 
misapprehension. While the war was going on many ac- 
counts were published in the newspapers describing the bar- 
rage across the English Channel, from Dover to Calais, 
and the belief was general that this barrier kept the U- 
boats from passing through. Unfortunately this was not 
the case. The surface boats did succeed in transporting 
almost at will troops and supplies across this narrow pas- 
sageway; but the mines, nets, and other obstructions that 
were intended to prevent the passage of submarines were not 
particularly effective. The British navy knew little about 
mines in 19 14; British naval men had always rather despised 
them as the "weapons of the weaker power," and it is there- 
fore not surprising that the so-called mine barrage at the 
Channel crossing was not successful. A large part of it was 
carried away by the strong tide and storms, and the mines 
were so defective that oysters and other sea growths, which 
attached themselves to their prongs, made many of them 
harmless. In 19 18, Admiral Sir Roger Keys reconstructed 
this barrage with a new type of mine and transformed it 
into a really effective barrier; but in the spring of 19 17, the 
German U-boats had little difficulty in slipping through, 
particularly in the night time. And from this point the 
distance to the trade routes south and west of Ireland was 
relatively a short one. 

Yet, terribly destructive as these U-boats were, the number 
which were operating simultaneously in this and in other 
fields was never very large. The extent to which the waters 
were infested with German , submarines was another par- 
ticularly ludicrous and particularly prevalent misappre- 
hension. Merchant vessels constantly reported that they 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 27 




MINE FIELDS THAT HEDGED IN THE SUBMARINES 
These are the mine fields through which the German submarines had to make 
their way into the North Sea and the other waters in which they operated. The 
diagram also shows the so-called safety channels. It sometimes took a squadron 
-of nine or ten surface German ships to get a submarine out of its base; it was neces- 
sary to sweep up all the mines which the Allies had laid to bar its progress. Thus 
mine laying and destroyer patrol were the two methods chiefly used, up to April, 
19 1 7, to overcome the submarine. 

had been assailed by "submarines in shoals," and most 
civilians still believe that they sailed together in flotillas, like 
schools of fish. There is hardly an American doughboy 
who did not see at least a dozen submarines on his way 
across the Atlantic; every streak of suds which was caused 
by a "tide rip," and every swimming porpoise, was im- 
mediately mistaken for the wake of a torpedo; and every bit 
of driftwood, in the fervid imagination of trans-Atlantic 
voyagers, immediately assumed the shape of a periscope. 



28 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Yet it is a fact that we knew almost every time a German 
submarine slunk from its base into the ocean. The Allied 
secret service was immeasurably superior to that of the 
Germans, and in saying this I pay particular tribute to the 
British Naval Intelligence Department. We always knew 
how many submarines the Germans had and we could 
usually tell pretty definitely their locations at a particular 
time; we also had accurate information about building opera- 
tions in Germany; thus we could estimate how many they were 
building and where they were building them, and we could 
also describe their essential characteristics, and the stage of 
progress which they had reached at almost any day. 

It was not the simplest thing to pilot a submarine out of its 
base. The Allies were constantly laying mines at these 
outlets; and before the U-boat could safely make its exit 
elaborate sweeping operations were necessary. It often 
took a squadron of nine or ten surface ships, working for 
several hours, to manoeuvre a submarine out of its base and 
to start it on its journey. For these reasons we could keep a 
careful watch upon its movements; we always knew when 
one of our enemies came out; we knew which one it was, and 
not infrequently we had learned the name of the commander 
and other valuable details. Moreover, we knew where it 
went, and we kept charts on which we plotted from day to 
day the voyage of each particular submarine. 

"Why didn't you sink it then?" is the question usually 
asked when 1 make this statement — a question which, as I 
shall show, merely reflects the ignorance which prevails 
everywhere on the underlying facts of submarine warfare. 

Now in this densely packed shipping area, which extended 
from the north of Ireland to Brest, there were seldom more 
than eight or ten submarines engaged in their peculiar form 
of warfare at one time. The largest number which 1 had any 
record of was fifteen; and this was an exceptional force; the 
usual number was four, six, eight, or perhaps ten. Yet 
the men upon our merchant convoys and troopships saw 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 29 

submarines scattered all over the sea. We estimated that 
the convoys and troopships reported that they had sighted 
about 300 submarines for every submarine which was 
actually in the field. Yet we knew that for every hundred 
submarines which the Germans possessed they could keep 
only ten or a dozen at work in the open sea. The rest were 
on their way to the hunting grounds, or returning, or they 
were in port being refitted and taking on supplies. Could 
Germany have kept fifty submarines constantly at work on 
the great shipping routes in the winter and spring of 19 17 — 
before we had learned how to handle the situation — nothing 
could have prevented her from winning the war. Instead 
of sinking 850,000 tons in a single month, she would have 
sunk 2,000,000 or 3,000,000 tons. The fact is that Germany, 
with all her microscopic preparations for war, neglected to 
provide herself with the one instrumentality with which 
she might have won it. 

This circumstance, that so few submarines could accom- 
plish such destructive results, shows how formidable was 
the problem which confronted us. Germany could do this, 
of course, because the restricted field in which she was able 
to operate was so constantly and so densely infested with 
valuable shipping. 

In the above I have been describing the operations of the 
U-boats in the great area to the west and south of Ireland. 
But there were other hunting fields, particularly that which 
lay on the east coast of England, in the area extending from 
Harwich to Newcastle. This part of the North Sea was 
constantly filled with ships passing between the North Sea 
ports of England and Norway and Sweden, carrying es- 
sential products like lumber and many manufactured ar- 
ticles. Every four days a convoy of from forty to sixty 
ships left some port in this region for Scandinavia ; I use the 
word "convoy," but the operation was a convoy only in the 
sense that the ships sailed in groups, for the navy was not 
able to provide them with an adequate escort — seldom 



30 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

furnishing them more than one or two destroyers, or a few 
yachts or trawlers. Smaller types of submarines which were 
known as UB's and UC's and which issued from Wil- 
helmshaven and the Skager Rack constantly preyed upon 
this coastal shipping. These submarines differed from the 
U-boats in that they were smaller, displacing about 350 and 
400 tons, and in that they also carried mines, which they 
were constantly laying. They were much handier than the 
larger types; they could rush out much more quickly from 
their bases and get back, and they did an immense amount 
of damage to this coastal trade. The value of the shipping 
sunk in these waters was unimportant when compared with 
the losses which Great Britain was suffering on the great 
trans-Atlantic routes, but the problem was still a serious one, 
because the supplies which these ships brought from the 
Scandinavian countries were essential to the military opera- 
tions in France. 

Besides these two types, the U-boats and the UB's and 
UC's, the Germans had another type of submarine, the 
great ocean cruisers. These ships were as long as a small 
surface cruiser and were half again as long as a destroyer, 
and their displacement sometimes reached 3,000 tons. They 
carried crews of seventy men, could cross the Atlantic three 
or four times without putting into port, and some actually 
remained away from their bases for three or four months. 
But they were vessels very difficult to manage; it took them a 
relatively long time to submerge, and, for this reason, they 
could not operate around the Channel and other places where 
the anti-submarine craft were most numerous. In fact, 
these vessels, of which the Germans had in commission 
perhaps half a dozen when the armistice was signed, ac- 
complished little in the war. The purpose for which they 
were built was chiefly a strategic one. One or two were 
usually stationed off the Azores, not in any expectation that 
they would destroy much shipping — the fact is that they 
sank very few merchantmen — but in the hope that they 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 3! 

might divert anti-submarine craft from the main theatre of 
operations. In this purpose, however, they were not suc- 
cessful; in fact, I cannot see that these great cruisers ac- 
complished anything that justified the expense and the 
trouble which were involved in building them. 

Ill 

THIS, then, was the type of warfare which the German 
submarines were waging upon the shipping of the Allied 
nations. What were the Allied navies doing to check them 
in this terrible month of April, 19 17? What anti-submarine 
methods had been developed up to that time? 

The most popular game on both sides of the Atlantic was 
devising means of checking the under water ship. Every 
newspaper, every magazine, every public man, and every 
gentleman at his club had a favorite scheme for defeating 
the U-boat campaign. All that any one needed for this 
engaging pastime was a map of the North Sea, and the 
solution appeared to be as clear as daylight. As Sir Eric 
Geddes once remarked to me, nothing is quite so deceptive 
as geography. All of us are too likely to base our conception 
of naval problems on the maps which we studied at school. 
On these maps the North Sea is such a little place! A young 
lady once declared in my hearing that she didn't see how the 
submarines could operate in the English Channel, it was so 
narrow ! She didn't see how there was room enough to turn 
around ! The fact that it is twenty miles wide at the shortest 
crossing and not far from two hundred at the widest is some- 
thing which it is apparently difficult to grasp. 

The plan which was most popular in those days was to 
pen the submarines in their bases and so prevent their 
egress into the North Sea. Obviously the best way to handle 
the situation was to sink the whole German submarine fleet; 
that was apparently impossible, and the next best thing was 
to keep them in their home ports and prevent them from 
sailing the high seas. It was not only the man in the street 



32 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

who was advocating this programme. I had a long talk 
with several prominent government officials, in which they 
asked me why this could not be done. 

"I can give you fourteen reasons why it is impossible," 
I answered. "We shall first have to capture the bases, and 
it would be simply suicidal to attempt it, and it would be 
playing directly into Germany's hands. Those bases are 
protected by powerful 15-, 1 1-, and 8-inch guns. These are 
secreted behind hills or located in pits on the seashore, 
where no approaching vessel can see them. Moreover, those 
guns have a range of 40,000 yards, but the guns on no ships 
have a range of more than 30,000 yards; they are stationary, 
whereas ours would be moving. For our ships to go up 
against such emplacements would be like putting a blind 
prize fighter up against an antagonist who can see and who 
has arms twice as long as his enemy's. We can send as 
many ships as we wish on such an expedition, and they will 
all be destroyed. The German guns would probably get 
them on the first salvo, certainly on the second. There is 
nothing the Germans would so much like to have us try." 

Another idea suggested by a glance at the map was the 
construction of a barrage across the North Sea from the 
Orkneys to the coast of Norway. The distance did not seem 
so very great — on the map; in reality, it was two hundred and 
thirty miles and the water is from 360 to 960 feet in depth. 
If we cannot pen the rats up in their holes, said the news- 
paper strategist, certainly we can do the next best thing: we 
can pen them up in the North Sea. Then we can route all 
our shipping to points on the west coast of England, and the 
problem is solved. 

I discussed this proposition with British navy men and 
their answer was quite to the point. 

" If we haven't mines enough to build a successful barrage 
across the Straits of Dover, which is only twenty miles wide, 
how can we construct a barrage across the North Sea, which 
is 230?" 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 33 

A year afterward, as will be shown later, this plan came 
up in more practical form, but in 191 7 the idea was not 
among the possibilities — there were not mines enough in the 
world to build such a barrage, nor had a mine then been in- 
vented that was suitable for the purpose. 

The belief prevailed in the United States, and, to a certain 
extent, in England itself, that the most effective means of 
meeting the submarine was to place guns and gun crews 
on all the mercantile vessels. Even some of the old British 
merchant salts maintained this view. "Give us a gun, and 
we'll take care of the submarines all right," they kept saying 
to the Admiralty. But the idea was fundamentally fal- 
lacious. In the American Congress, just prior to the declara- 
tion of war, the arming of merchant ships became a great 
political issue; scores of pages in the Congressional Record 
are filled with debates on this subject, yet, so far as affording 
any protection to shipping was concerned, all this was wasted 
oratory. Those who advocated arming the merchant ships 
as an effective method of counteracting submarine cam- 
paigns had simply failed to grasp the fundamental elements 
of submarine warfare. They apparently did not understand 
the all-important fact that the quality which makes the sub- 
marine so difficult to deal with is its invisibility. The great 
political issue which was involved in the submarine con- 
troversy, and the issue which brought the United States into 
the war, was that the Germans were sinking merchant ships 
without warning. And it was because of this very fact — 
this sinking without warning — that a dozen guns on a mer- 
chant ship afforded practically no protection. The lookout 
on a merchantman could not see the submarine, for the all- 
sufficient reason that the submarine was concealed beneath 
the water; it was only by a happy chance that the most 
penetrating eye could detect the periscope, provided that 
one were exposed. The first intimation which was given 
the merchantman that a U-boat was in his neighborhood 
was the explosion of the torpedo in his hull. In six weeks. 



34 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

in the spring and eariy summer of 19 17, thirty armed mer- 
chantmen were torpedoed and sunk off Queenstown, and in 
no case was a periscope or a conning tower seen. The Eng- 
lish never trusted their battleships at sea without destroyer 
escort, and certainly if a battleship with its powerful arma- 
ment could not protect itself from submarines, it was too 
much to expect that an ordinary armed merchantman would 
be able to do so. I think the fact that few American armed 
ships were attacked and sunk in 19 17 created the impression 
that their guns afforded them some protection. But the 
apparent immunity extended to them was really policy on 
Germany's part. She expected, as I have said, that she 
would win the war long before the United States could play 
an effective role in the struggle. It was therefore good 
international politics to refrain from any unnecessary acts 
that would still further embitter the American people against 
her. There was also a considerable pacifist element in our 
country which Germany was coddling in the hope of pre- 
venting the United States from using against her such forces 
as we already had at hand. The reason American armed 
merchantmen were not sunk was simply because they were 
not seriously attacked; I have already shown how easily 
Germany could have sunk them if she had really tried. Any 
reliance upon armed guards as a protection against sub- 
marines would have been fundamentally a mistake, for the 
additional reason that it was a defensive measure; it must be 
apparent that the extremely grave situation which we were then 
facing demanded the most energetic offensive methods. Yet the 
arming of merchant ships was justified as a minor measure. 
It accomplished the one important end of forcing the subma- 
rine to submerge and to use torpedoes instead of gunfire. In 
itself this was a great gain; obviously the Germans would 
much prefer to sink ships with projectiles than with torpe- 
does, for their supply of these latter missiles was limited.* 
In April, 191 7, the British navy was fighting the submarine 

*See Appendix IV for my statement to Washington on arming merchant Ships. 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 35 

mainly in two ways: it was constantly sowing mines off the 
entrance to the submarine bases, such as Ostend and Zee- 
brugge, and in the Heligoland Bight — operations that ac- 
complished little, for the Germans swept them up almost as 
fast as they were planted; and it was patrolling the sub- 
marine infested area with anti-submarine craft. The Admi- 
ralty was depending almost exclusively upon this patrol, yet 
this, the only means which then seemed to hold forth much 
promise of defeating the submarine, was making little progress. 
For this patrol the navy was impressing into service all the 
destroyers, yachts, trawlers, sea-going tugs, and other light 
vessels which could possibly be assembled; almost any 
craft which could carry a wireless, a gun, and depth 
charges was boldly sent to sea. At this time the vessel 
chiefly used was the destroyer. The naval war had dem- 
onstrated that the submarine could not successfully battle 
with the destroyer; that any U-boat which came to the sur- 
face within fighting range of this alert and speedy little sur- 
face ship ran great risk of being sunk. This is the funda- 
mental fact — that the destruction of the submarine was 
highly probable, in case the destroyer could get a fair chance 
at her — which regulated the whole anti-submarine campaign. 
It is evident, therefore, that a proper German strategy would 
consist in so disposing its submarines that they could conduct 
their operations with the minimum risk of meeting their 
most effective enemies, while a properly conceived Allied 
strategy would consist in so controlling the situation that the 
submarines would have constantly to meet them. Frank- 
ness compels me to say that, in the early part of 19 17, the 
Germans were maintaining the upper hand in this strategic 
game; they were holding the dominating position in the cam- 
paign, since they were constantly attacking Allied shipping 
without having to meet the Allied destroyers, while the Allied 
destroyers were dispersing their energies over the wide waste 
of waters. But the facts in the situation, and not any 
superior skill on the part of the German navy, were giving 



36 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the submarines this advantage. The British were most 
heroically struggling against the difficulties imposed by 
the mighty task which they had assumed. The British 
navy, like all other navies, was only partially prepared 
for this type of warfare; in 19 17 it did not possess de- 
stroyers enough both to guard the main fighting fleet and 
to protect its commerce from submarines. Up to 19 14, 
indeed, it was expected that the destroyers would have only 
one function to perform in warfare, that of protecting the 
great surface vessels from attack, but now the new kind of 
warfare which Germany was waging on merchant ships had 
laid upon the destroyer an entirely new responsibility; and 
the plain fact is that the destroyers, in the number which 
were required, did not exist. 

The problem which proved so embarrassing can be stated 
in the simple terms of arithmetic. Everything, as I have 
said, reduced itself to the question of destroyers. In April, 
19 1 7, the British navy had in commission about 200 ships 
of this indispensable type; many of them were old and others 
had been pretty badly worn and weakened by three years of 
particularly racking service. It was the problem of the 
Admiralty to place these destroyers in those fields in which 
they could most successfully serve the Allied cause. The 
one requirement that necessarily took precedence over all 
others was that a flotilla of at least 100 destroyers must be 
continuously kept with the Grand Fleet, ready to go into 
action at a moment's notice. It is clear from this statement 
of the case that the naval policy of the Germans, which con- 
sisted in holding their high seas battle fleet in harbor and in 
refusing to fight the Allied navy, had an important bearing 
upon the submarine campaign. So long as there was the pos- 
sibility of such an engagement, the British Grand Fleet had 
to keep itself constantly prepared for such a crisis; and an 
indispensable part of this preparation was to maintain always 
in readiness its flotilla of protecting destroyers. Had the 
German fleet seriously engaged in a great sea battle, it would 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 37 

have unquestionably been defeated; such a defeat would have 
meant an even greater disaster than the loss of the battle- 
ships, a loss which in itself would not greatly have changed 
the naval situation. But the really fatal effect of such 
a defeat would have been that it would no longer have 
been necessary for the British to sequestrate a hundred or 
more destroyers at Scapa Flow. The German battleships 
would have been sent to the bottom, and then these destroyers 
would have been used in the warfare against the submarines. 
By keeping its dreadnaught fleet intact, always refusing to 
give battle and yet always threatening an engagement, the 
Germans thus were penning up 100 British destroyers in the 
Orkneys — destroyers which otherwise might have done most 
destructive work against the German submarines off the 
coast of Ireland. The mere fact that the German High 
Seas Fleet had once engaged the British Grand Fleet 
off Jutland was an element in the submarine situation, 
for this constantly suggested the likelihood that the at- 
tempt might be repeated, and was thus an influence which 
tended to keep these destroyers at Scapa Flow. Many times 
during that critical period the Admiralty discussed the ques- 
tion of releasing those destroyers, or a part of them, for the 
anti-submarine campaign ; yet they always decided, and they 
decided wisely, against any such hazardous division. At 
that time the German dreadnaught fleet was not immeasur- 
ably inferior in numbers to the British; it had a protecting 
screen of about 100 destroyers; and it would have been mad- 
ness for the British to have gone into battle with its own 
destroyer screen placed several hundred miles away, off the 
coast of Ireland. I lay stress upon this circumstance be- 
cause I find that in America the British Admiralty has been 
criticised for keeping a large destroyer force with the Grand 
Fleet, instead of detaching them for battle with the sub- 
marine. I think that I have made clear that this criticism 
is based upon a misconception of the whole naval campaign. 
Without this destroyer screen the British Grand Fleet 



38 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

might have been destroyed by the Germans; if the Grand 
Fleet had been destroyed, the war would have ended in the 
defeat of the Allies; not to have maintained these destroyers 
in northern waters would thus have amounted simply to 
betraying the cause of civilization and to making Germany 
a free gift of victory. 

Germany likewise practically immobilized a considerable 
number of British destroyers by attacking hospital ships. 
When the news of such dastardly attacks became known 
it was impossible for Americans and Englishmen to believe 
at first that they were intentional ; they so callously violated 
all the rules of warfare and all the agreements for lessening 
the horrors of war to which Germany herself had become a 
party that there was a tendency in both enlightened coun- 
tries to give the enemy the benefit of the doubt. As a 
matter of fact, not only were the submarine attacks on 
hospital ships deliberate, but Germany had officially in- 
formed us that they would be made! The reasons for this 
warning are clear enough; again, the all-important role 
which the destroyers were playing in anti-submarine warfare 
was the point at issue. Until we received such warning, 
hospital ships had put to sea unescorted by warships, de- 
pending for their safety upon the rules of the Hague Con- 
ference. Germany attacked these ships in order to make 
us escort them with destroyers, and thereby compel us to 
divert these destroyers from the anti-submarine campaign. 
And, of course, England was forced to acquiesce in this 
German programme. Had the Anglo-Saxon mind resembled 
the Germanic in all probability we should have accepted the 
logic of the situation ; we should have refused to be diverted 
from the great strategic purpose which meant winning the 
war — that is, protecting merchant shipping; in other words, 
we should have left the hospital ships to their fate, and 
justified ourselves and stilled our consciences by the principle 
of the greater good. But the British and the American minds 
do not operate that way; it was impossible for us to leave 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 39 

sick and wounded men as prey to submarines. Therefore, 
after receiving the German warning, backed up, as it was, 
by the actual destruction of unprotected hospital ships, we 
began providing them with destroyer escorts. This greatly 
embarrassed us in the anti-submarine campaign, for at times, 
especially during the big drives, we had a large number of 
hospital ships to protect. As soon as we adopted this 
policy, Germany, having attained her end, which was 
to keep the destroyers out of the submarine area, stopped 
attacking sick and wounded soldiers. Yet we still were 
forced to provide these unfortunates with destroyer escorts, 
for, had we momentarily withdrawn these protectors, the 
German submarines would immediately have renewed their 
attacks on hospital ships. 

Not only was the British navy at that time safeguarding 
the liberties of mankind at sea, but its army in France was 
doing its share in safeguarding them on land. And the fact 
that Britain had to support this mighty army did its part 
in making British shipping at times almost an easy prey for 
the German submarines. For next in importance to main- 
taining the British Grand Fleet intact it was necessary to 
keep secure the channel crossing. Over this little strip of 
water were transported the men and the supplies from 
England to France that kept the German army at bay; to 
have suspended these communications, even for a brief period, 
would have meant that the Germans would have captured 
Paris, overrun the whole of France, and ended the war, at 
least the war on land. In the course of four years Great 
Britain transported about 20,000,000 people across the Chan- 
nel without the loss of a single soul. She accomplished this 
only by constantly using many destroyers and other light 
surface craft as escorts for the transports. But this was not 
the only responsibility of the kind that rested on the over- 
burdened British shoulders. There was another part of the 
seas in which, for practical and political reasons, the British 
destroyer fleet had to do protective duty. In the Mediter- 



40 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

ranean lay not only the trade routes to the East, but also 
the lines of supply which extended to Italy, to Egypt, to 
Palestine, and to Mesopotamia. If Germany could have 
cut off Italy's food and materials Italy would have been 
forced to withdraw from the war. The German and Aus- 
trian submarines, escaping from Austria's Adriatic ports, were 
constantly assailing this commerce, attempting to do this very 
thing. Moreover, the success of the German submarine cam- 
paign in these waters would have compelled the Allies to 
abandon the Saloniki expedition, which would have left the 
Central Powers absolute masters of the Balkans and the 
Middle East. For these reasons it was necessary to maintain 
a considerable force of destroyers in the Mediterranean. 

For the British navy it was therefore a matter of choice 
what areas she would attempt to protect with her destroyer 
forces; the one thing that was painfully apparent was that 
she could not satisfactorily safeguard all the danger zones. 
With the inadequate force at her disposal it was inevitable 
that certain areas should be left relatively open to the 
U-boats; and the decision as to which ones these should be 
was simply a matter of balancing the several conflicting in- 
terests. In April, 19 17, the Admiralty had decided to give 
the preference to the Grand Fleet, the hospital ships, the 
Channel crossing, and the Mediterranean, practically in the 
order mentioned. It is evident from these facts that 
nearly the entire destroyer fleet must have been disposed in 
these areas. This decision, all things considered, was the 
only one that was possible; yet, after placing the destroyers 
in these selected areas, the great zone of trans-Atlantic ship- 
ping, west and south of Ireland, vitally important as it was, 
was necessarily left inadequately protected. So desperate 
was the situation that sometimes only four or five British 
destroyers were operating in this great stretch of waters; 
and I do not think that the number ever exceeded fifteen. 
Inasmuch as that represented about the number of Ger- 
man submarines in this same area, the situation may strike 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 41 

the layman as not particularly desperate. But any such 
basis of comparison is absurd. The destroyers were operat- 
ing on the surface in full view of the submarines; the sub- 
marines could submerge at any time and make themselves 
invisible; and herein we have the reason why the contest 
v/as so markedly unequal. But aside from all other con- 
siderations, the method of warfare adopted by the Allies 
against the U-boat was necessarily ineffective, but was the 
best that could be used until sufficient destroyers became 
available to convoy shipping. The so-called submarine 
patrol, under the circumstances which prevailed at that time, 
could accomplish very little. This little fleet of destroyers 
was based on Queenstown; from this port they put forth 
and patrolled the English Channel and the waters about 
Ireland in the hope that a German submarine would 
stick its nose above the waves. The central idea of the de- 
stroyer patrol was this one of hunting; the destroyer could 
have sunk any submarine or driven it away from shipping 
if the submarine would only have made its presence known. 
But of course this was precisely what the submarine 
declined to do. It must be evident to the merest novice 
that four or five destroyers, rushing around hunting 
for submarines which were lying a hundred feet or so 
under water, could accomplish very little. The under-water 
boat could always see its surface enemy long before it was 
itself seen and thus could save its life by the simple process 
of submerging. It must also be clear that the destroyer 
patrol could accomplish much only in case there were a very 
large number of destroyers. We figured that, to make 
the patrol system work with complete success, it would be 
necessary to have one destroyer for every square mile. The 
area of the destroyer patrol off Queenstown comprised 
about 25,000 square miles; it is apparent that the complete 
protection of the trans-Atlantic trade routes would have 
taken about 25,000 destroyers. And the British, as I have 
said, had available anywhere from four to fifteen in this area. 



42 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

The destroyer flotilla being so small, it is not surprising 
that the German submarines were making ducks and drakes 
of it. The map of the sinkings which took place in April, 
published herewith [page 12], brings out an interesting fact: 
numerous as these sinkings were, very few merchantmen were 
torpedoed, in this month, at the entrance to the Irish Sea or 
in the English Channel. These were the narrow waters where 
shipping was massed and where the little destroyer patrol was 
intended to operate. The German submarines apparently 
avoided these waters, and made their attacks out in the 
open sea, sometimes two and three hundred miles west and 
south of Ireland. Their purpose in doing this was to draw 
the destroyer patrol out into the open sea and in that way to 
cause its dispersal. And these tactics were succeeding. 
There were six separate steamship "lanes" by which the 
merchantmen could approach the English Channel and the 
Irish Sea. One day the submarines would attack along one 
of these lanes; then the little destroyer fleet would rush to 
this scene of operations. Immediately the Germans would 
depart and attack another route many miles away; then the 
destroyers would go pell mell for that location. Just as they 
arrived, however, the U-boats would begin operating else- 
where; and so it went, a game of hide and seek in which the 
advantages lay all on the side of the warships which pos- 
sessed that wonderful abiHty to make themselves unseen. 
At this period the submarine campaign and the anti-sub- 
marine campaign was really a case of blindman's buff; the 
destroyer could never see the enemy while the enemy could 
always see the destroyer; and this is the reason that the Allies 
were failing and that the Germans were succeeding. 

IV 

TO SHOW how serious the situation was, let me quote 
from the reports which I sent to Washington during this 
period. I find statements like these scattered everywhere in 
my despatches of the spring of 191 7: 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 43 

"The military situation presented by the enemy subma- 
rine campaign is not only serious but critical." 

"The outstanding fact which cannot be escaped is that 
we are not succeeding, or in other words, that the enemy's 
campaign is proving successful." 

"The consequences of failure or partial failure of the 
Allied cause which we have joined are of such far-reaching 
character that I am deeply concerned in insuring that the 
part played by our country shall stand every test of analysis 
before the bar of history. The situation at present is ex- 
ceedingly grave. If sufficient United States naval forces 
can be thrown into the balance at the present critical time 
and place there is little doubt that early success will be 
assured." 

"Briefly stated, I consider that at the present moment 
we are losing the war." * 

And now came another important question: what should 
the American naval policy be in this crisis? There were 
almost as many conflicting opinions as there were minds. 
Certain authorities believed that our whole North Atlantic 
Fleet should be moved immediately into European waters. 
Such a manoeuvre was not only impossible but it would have 
been strategically very unwise; indeed such a disposition 
would have been playing directly into Germany's hands. 
What naval experts call the "logistics" of the situation im- 
mediately ruled this idea out of consideration. The one 
fact which made it impossible to base the fleet in European 
waters at that time was that we could not have kept it sup- 
plied, particularly with oil. The German U-boats were 
making a particularly successful drive at tankers with the 
result that England had the utmost difficulty in supplying 
her fleet with this kind of fuel. It is indeed impossible to 
exaggerate the seriousness of this oil situation. "Orders 
have just been given to use three fifths speed, except in case 

• For specimens of my reports to the Navy Department in these early days see 
Appendices 1 1 and III. 



44 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

of emergency," I reported to Washington on June 29th, 
referring to scarcity of oil. "This simply means that the 
enemy is winning the war." It was lucky for us that the 
Germans knew nothing about this particular disability. 
Had they been aware of it, they would have resorted to all 
kinds of manoeuvres in the attempt to keep the Grand Fleet 
constantly steaming at sea, and in this way they might so 
have exhausted our oil supply as possibly to threaten the 
actual command of the surface. Fortunately for the cause 
of civilization, there were certain important facts which the 
German Secret Service did not learn. 

But this oil scarcity made it impossible to move the 
Atlantic Fleet into European waters, at least at that time. 
Since most oil supplies were brought from America, we 
simply could not have fueled our super-dreadnaughts in 
Europe in the spring and summer of 191 7. Moreover, if 
we had sent all our big ships to England we should have 
been obliged to keep our destroyers constantly stationed with 
them ready for a great sea action ; and this would have com- 
pletely fallen in with German plans, for then these destroyers 
could not have been used against her submarines. The British 
did indeed request that we send five coal-burning ships to 
reinforce her fleet and give her that preponderance which 
made its ascendancy absolutely secure, and these ships were 
subsequently sent ; but England could not have made provi- 
sion for our greatest dreadnaughts, the oil burners. Indeed 
our big ships were of much greater service to the Allied cause 
stationed on this side than they would have been if they had 
been located at a European base. They were providing a 
reserve for the British fleet, precisely as our armies in France 
were providing a reserve for the Allied armies; and meanwhile 
this disposition made it possible for us to send their destroyer 
escorts to the submarine zone, where they could participate 
in the anti-submarine campaign. In American waters these 
big ships could be kept in prime condition, for here they had 
an open, free sea for training, and here they could also be 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 45 

used to train the thousands of new men who were needed for 
the new ships constructed during the war. 

I early took the stand that our forces should be considered 
chiefly in the light of reinforcements to the Allied navies, and 
that, ignoring all question of national pride and even what at 
first might superficially seem to be national interest, we 
should exert such offensive power as we possessed in the way 
that would best assist the Allies in defeating the submarine. 
England's naval resources were much greater than ours; and 
therefore, in the nature of the case, we could not expect to 
maintain overseas anywhere near the number of ships which 
England had assembled; consequently it should be our 
policy to use such available units as we possessed to 
strengthen the weak spots in the Allied line. There were 
those who believed that national dignity required that we 
should build up an independent navy in European waters, 
and that we should operate it as a distinct American unit. 
But that, I maintained, was not the way to win the war. If 
we had adopted this course, we should have been constructing 
naval bases and perfecting an organization when the 
armistice was signed; indeed, the idea of operating independ- 
ently of the Allied fleet was not for a moment to be con- 
sidered. There were others in America who thought that 
it was unwise to put any part of our fleet in European 
waters, in view of the dangers that might assail us on our 
own coast. There was every expectation that Germany 
would send submarines to the western Atlantic, where they 
could prey upon our shipping and could possibly bombard 
our ports; 1 have already shown that she had submarines 
which could make such a long voyage, and the strategy of 
the situation in April and May, 19 17, demanded that a move 
of this kind be made. The predominant element in the sub- 
marine defense, as I have pointed out, was the destroyer. 
The only way in which the United States could immediately 
and effectively help the Allied navies was by sending our 
whole destroyer flotilla and all our light surface craft at once. 



46 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

It was Germany's part, therefore, to resort to every ma- 
noeuvre that would keep our destroyer force on this side of the 
Atlantic. Such a performance might be expected to startle 
our peaceful American population and inspire a public de- 
mand for protection; and in this way our Government might 
be compelled to keep all anti-submarine craft in our own 
waters. I expected Germany to make such a demonstration 
immediately and I therefore cautioned our naval authorities 
at Washington not to be deceived. I pointed out that Ger- 
many could accomplish practically nothing by sporadic 
attacks on American shipping in American waters; that, 
indeed, if we could induce the German Admiralty to con- 
centrate all its submarine efforts on the American coasts, 
and leave free the Irish Sea and the English Channel, the 
war practically would be won for the Allies. Yet these facts 
were not apparent to the popular mind in 191 7, and I shall 
always think that Germany made a great mistake in not 
sending submarines to the American coast immediately on 
our declaration of war, instead of waiting until 19 18. Such 
attacks, at that time, would have started a public demand for 
protection which the Washington authorities might have had 
great difficulty in resisting, and which might have actually 
kept our destroyer fleet in American waters, to the great det- 
riment of the Allied cause. Germany evidently refrained 
from doing so for reasons which I have already indicated — 
a desire to deal gently with the United States, and in that 
way to delay our military preparations and win the war with- 
out coming into bloody conflict with the American people. 

There were others who thought it unwise to expose any 
part of our fleet to the dangers of the European contest; 
their fear was that, if the Allies should be defeated, we would 
then need all our naval forces to protect the American coast. 
This point of view, of course, was not only short sighted and 
absurd, but it violated the fundamental principle of war- 
fare, which is that a belHgerent must assail his enemy as 
quickly as possible with the greatest striking power which be 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 47 

can assemble. Clearly our national policy demanded that 
we should exert all the force we could collect to make certain 
a German defeat. The best way to fight Germany was not 
to wait until she had vanquished the Allies, but to join hands 
with them in a combined effort to annihilate her military 
power on land and sea. The situation which confronted us 
in April, 191 7, was one which demanded an immediate and 
powerful offensive; the best way to protect America was to 
destroy Germany's naval power in European waters and thus 
make certain that she could not attack us at home. 

The fact is that few nations have ever been placed in so 
tragical a position as that in which Great Britain found 
herself in the spring and early summer of 191 7. And I 
think that history records few spectacles more heroic than 
that of the great British navy, fighting this hideous and 
cowardly form of warfare in half a dozen places with pitifully 
inadequate forces, but with an undaunted spirit which re- 
mained firm even against the fearful odds which I have 
described. What an opportunity for America! And it 
was perfectly apparent what we should do. It was our 
duty immediately to place all our available anti-submarine 
craft in those waters west and south of Ireland in which 
lay the pathways of the shipping which meant life or 
death to the Allied cause — the area which England, because 
almost endless demands were being made upon her navy in 
other fields, was unable to protect. 

The first four days in London were spent collecting all 
possible data; I had no desire to alarm Washington unwar- 
rantably, yet I also believed that it would be a serious 
dereliction if all the facts were not presented precisely as 
they were. I consulted practically everyone who could give 
me essential details and wrote a cable despatch, filling 
four fool's cap pages, which furnished Washington with its 
first detailed account of the serious state of the cause on 
which we had embarked.* 

*See Appendix II. 



48 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

In this work I had the full cooperation of our Ambassador 
in London, Mr. Walter Hines Page. Mr. Page's whole 
heart and mind were bound up in the Allied cause; he was 
zealous that his country should play worthily its part in this 
great crisis in history; and he worked unsparingly with me to 
get the facts before our government. A few days after send- 
ing a despatch it occurred to me that a message from our 
Ambassador might give emphasis to my own. I therefore 
wrote such a message and took it down to Brighton, where 
the American Ambassador was taking a little rest. I did 
not know just how strong a statement Mr. Page would care 
to become responsible for, and so I did not make this state- 
ment quite as emphatic as the circumstances justified. 

Mr. Page took the paper and read it carefully. Then he 
looked up. 

" It isn't strong enough," he said. " I think I can do bet- 
ter than this myself." 

He sat down and wrote the following cablegram which 
was immediately sent to the President: 

From: Ambassador Page. 
To: Secretary of State. 
Sent: 27 April 1917. 

Very confidential for Secretary and President. 

There is reason for the greatest alarm about the issue of the war 
caused by the increasing success of the German submarines. I 
have it from official sources that during the week ending 22nd 
April, 88 ships of 237,000 tons allied and neutral were lost. The 
number of vessels unsuccessfully attacked indicated a great in- 
crease in the number of submarines in action. 

This means practically a million tons lost every month till the 
shorter days of autumn come. By that time the sea will be about 
clear of shipping. Most of the ships are sunk to the westward and 
southward of Ireland. The British have in that area every avail- 
able anti-submarine craft, but their force is so insufficient that they 
hardly discourage the submarines. 

The British transport of troops and supplies is already strained 



WHEN GERMANY WAS WINNING 49 

to the utmost, and the maintenance of the armies in the field is 
threatened. There is food enough here to last the civil population 
only not more than six weeks or two months. 

Whatever help the United States may render at any time in the 
future, or in any theatre of the war, our help is now more seriously 
needed in this submarine area for the sake of all the Allies than it 
can ever be needed again, or anywhere else. 

After talking over this critical situation with the Prime Minister 
and other members of the Government, I cannot refrain from most 
strongly recommending the immediate sending over of every 
destroyer and all other craft that can be of anti-submarine use. 
This seems to me the sharpest crisis of the war, and the most 
dangerous situation for the Allies that has arisen or could arise. 

If enough submarines can be destroyed in the next two or three 
months the war will be won, and if we can contribute effective help 
immediately it will be won directly by our aid. 1 cannot exag- 
gerate the pressing and increasing danger of this situation. Thirty 
or more destroyers and other similar craft sent by us immediately 
would very likely be decisive. 

There is no time to be lost. 

[Signed] Page. 

But Mr. Page and I thought that we had not completely 
done our duty even after sending these urgent messages. 
Whatever might happen, we were determined that it could 
never be charged that we had not presented the Allied situa- 
tion in its absolutely true light. It seemed likely that an 
authoritative statement from the British Government would 
give added assurance that our statements were not the result 
of panic, and with this idea in mind, Mr. Page and I called 
upon Mr. Balfour, Foreign Secretary, who, in response to 
our request, sent a despatch to Washington describing the 
seriousness of the situation. 

All these messages made the same point: that the United 
States should immediately assemble all its destroyers and 
other light craft, and send them to the port where they 
could render the greatest service in the anti-submarine 
campaign — Queenstown. 



CHAPTER II 
THE RETURN OF THE "MAYFLOWER" 

I 

THE morning of May 4, 19 17, witnessed an import- 
ant event in the history of Queenstown. The news 
had been printed in no British or American paper, 
yet in some mysterious way it had reached nearly 
everybody in the city. A squadron of American destroyers, 
which had left Boston on the evening of April 24th, had al- 
ready been reported to the westward of Ireland and was due 
to reach Queenstown that morning. At almost the ap- 
pointed hour a little smudge of smoke appeared in the 
distance, visible to the crowds assembled on the hills; then 
presently another black spot appeared, and then another; and 
finally these flecks upon the horizon assumed the form of six 
rapidly approaching warships. The Stars and Stripes were 
broken out on public buildings, on private houses, and on 
nearly all the water craft in the harbor; the populace, armed 
with American flags, began to gather on the shore; and the 
local dignitaries donned their official robes to welcome the 
new friends from overseas. One of the greatest days in 
Anglo-American history had dawned, for the first contingent 
of the American navy was about to arrive in British waters 
and join hands with the Allies in the battle against the forces 
of darkness and savagery. 

The morning was an unusually brilliant one. The storms 
which had tossed our little vessels on the seas for ten days, 
and which had followed them nearly to the Irish coast, had 
suddenly given way to smooth water and a burst of sunshine. 
The long and graceful American ships steamed into the 

50 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 51 

channel amid the cheers of the people and the tooting of all 
harbor craft ; the sparkling waves, the greenery of the border- 
ing hills, the fruit trees already in bloom, to say nothing of 
the smiling and cheery faces of the welcoming Irish people, 
seemed to promise a fair beginning for our great adventure. 
"Welcome to the American colours," had been the signal of 
the Mary Rose, a British destroyer which had been sent to 
lead the Americans to their anchorage. "Thank you, I am 
glad of your company," answered the Yankee commander; 
and these messages represented the spirit of the whole pro- 
ceeding. Indeed there was something in these strange-look- 
ing American ships, quite unlike the British destroyers, that 
necessarily inspired enthusiasm and respect. They were 
long and slender; the sunlight, falling upon their graceful 
sides and steel decks, made them brilliant objects upon the 
water; and their business-like guns and torpedo tubes sug- 
gested efficiency and readiness. The fact that they had 
reached their appointed rendezvous exactly on time, and that 
they had sailed up the Queenstown harbor at almost pre- 
cisely the moment that preparations had been made to 
receive them, emphasized this impression. The appearance 
of our officers on the decks in their unfamiliar, closely fitting 
blouses, and of our men, in their neat white linen caps, also 
at once won the hearts of the populace. 

"Sure an' it's our own byes comin' back to us," an Irish 
woman remarked, as she delightedly observed the unmis- 
takably Gaelic countenances of a considerable proportion 
of the crew. Indeed the natives of Queenstown seemed to 
regard these American bluejackets almost as their own. The 
welcome provided by these people was not of a formal kind; 
they gathered spontaneously to cheer and to admire. In 
that part of Ireland there was probably not a family that did 
not have relatives or associations in the United States, and 
there was scarcely a home that did not possess some memento 
of America. The beautiful Queenstown Roman Catholic 
Cathedral, which stood out so conspicuously, had been built 



52 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

very largely with American dollars, and the prosperity of 
many a local family had the same trans-Atlantic origin. It 
was hardly surprising, therefore, that when our sailors landed 
for a few hours' liberty many hands were stretched out to 
welcome them. Their friends took them arm in arm, 
marched them to their homes, and entertained them with food 
and drink, all the time plying them with questions about 
friends and relatives in America. Most of these young 
Americans with Irish ancestry had never seen Ireland, but 
that did not prevent the warm-hearted people of Queens- 
town from hailing them as their own. This cordiality was 
appreciated, for the trip across the Atlantic had been very 
severe, with gales and rain storms nearly every day. 

The senior officer in charge was Commander Joseph K. 
Taussig, whose flagship was the IVadsworth. The other ves- 
sels of the division and their commanding officers were the 
Conyngham, Commander Alfred W. Johnson; the Porter, 
Lieutenant-Commander Ward K. Wortman ; the McDougal, 
Lieutenant-Commander Arthur P. Fairfield; the Davis, 
Lieutenant-Commander Rufus F. Zogbaum; and the fVain- 
wright, Lieutenant-Commander Fred H. Poteet. On the 
outbreak of hostilities these vessels, comprising our Eighth 
Destroyer Division, had been stationed at Base 2, in the 
York River, Virginia; at 7 p. m. of April 6th, the day that 
Congress declared war on Germany, their commander had 
received the following signal from the Pennsylvania, the 
flagship of the Atlantic Fleet: "Mobilize for war in ac- 
cordance with Department's confidential mobilization plan 
of March 21st." From that time events moved rapidly for 
the Eighth Division. On April 14th, the very day on which 
I sent my first report on submarine conditions to Washington, 
Commander Taussig received a message to take his flotilla to 
Boston and there fit out for "long and distant service." Ten 
days afterward he sailed, with instructions to go fifty miles 
due east of Cape Cod and there to open his sealed orders. At 
the indicated spot Commander Taussig broke the seal, and 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 53 

read the following document — a paper so important in 
history, marking as it does the first instructions any Ameri- 
can naval or army officer had received for engaging directly 
in hostilities with Germany, that it is worth quoting in full: 

NAVY DEPARTMENT 

Office of Naval Operations 
Washington, D, C. 

Secret and Confidential 

To: Commander, Eighth Division, Destroyer Force, Atlantic 
Fleet, U. S. S. IVadsworth, Flagship. 

Subject: Protection of commerce near the coasts of Great 
Britain and Ireland. 

1. The British Admiralty have requested the cooperation of a 
division of American destroyers in the protection of commerce near 
the coasts of Great Britain and France. 

2. Your mission is to assist naval operations of Entente Powers in 
every way possible. 

3. Proceed to Queenstown, Ireland. Report to senior British 
naval officer present, and thereafter cooperate fully with the 
British navy. Should it be decided that your force act in coopera- 
tion with French naval forces your mission and method of coopera- 
tion under French Admiralty authority remain unchanged. 

Route to Queenstown. 

Boston to latitude 50 N — Long. 20 W to arrive at daybreak 
then to latitude 50 N. — Long. 12 W thence to Queenstown. 
When within radio communication of the British naval forces off 
Ireland, call G CK and inform the Vice-Admiral at Queenstown in 
British general code of your position, course, and speed. You will 
be met outside of Queenstown. 

4. Base facilities will be provided by the British Admiralty. 

5. Communicate your orders and operations to Rear- Admiral 
Sims at London and be guided by such instructions as he may give 
you. Make no reports of arrival to Navy Department direct. 

JosEPHus Daniels. 



54 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

No happier selection for the command of this division 
could have been made than that of Commander Taussig. In 
addition to his qualities as a sailor, certain personal as- 
sociations made him particularly acceptable to the British 
naval authorities. In 1900, Commander Taussig, then a 
midshipman, was a member of the naval forces which 
the United States sent to China to cooperate with other 
powers in putting down the Boxer Rebellion and rescuing the 
besieged legations in Pekin. Near Tientsin this interna- 
tional force saw its hardest fighting, and here Commander 
Taussig was wounded. While recovering from his injury, 
the young American found himself lying on a cot side by side 
with an English captain, then about forty years old, who was 
in command of the Centurion and chief-of-staff to Admiral 
Seymour, who had charge of the British forces. This 
British officer was severely wounded; a bullet had penetrated 
his lung, and for a considerable period he was unable to lie 
down. Naturally this enforced companionship made the 
two men friends. Commander Taussig had had many 
occasions to recall this association since, for his wounded 
associate was Captain John R. Jellicoe, whose advancement 
in the British navy had been rapid from that day onward. 
On this same expedition Captain Jellicoe became a sincere 
friend also of Captain McCalla, the American who com- 
manded the Newark and the American landing force; indeed, 
Jellicoe's close and cordial association with the American 
navy dates from the Boxer expedition. Naturally Taussig 
had watched Jellicoe's career with the utmost interest; since 
he was only twenty-one at the time, however, and the 
EngHshman was twice his age, it had never occurred to him 
that the First Sea Lord would remember his youthful hos- 
pital companion. Yet the very first message he received, on 
arriving in Irish waters, was the following letter, brought 
to him by Captain Evans, the man designated by the 
British Admiralty as liaison oificer with the American 
destroyers: 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 55 

Admiralty, Whitehall. 

1-5-17. 
My dear Taussig: 

I still retain very pleasant and vivid recollections of our associa- 
tion in China and 1 am indeed delighted that you should have been 
selected for the command of the first force which is coming to fight 
for freedom, humanity, and civilization. We shall all have our 
work cut out to subdue piracy. My experience in China makes me 
feel perfectly convinced that the two nations will work in the 
closest cooperation, and 1 won't flatter you by saying too much 
about the value of your help. I must say this, however. There is 
no navy in the world that can possibly give us more valuable 
assistance, and there is no personnel in any navy that will fight 
better than yours. My China experience tells me this. 

If only my dear friend McCalla could have seen this day how 
glad 1 would have been ! 

I must offer you and all your officers and men the warmest 
welcome possible in the name of the British nation and the British 
Admiralty, and add to it every possible good wish from myself. 
May every good fortune attend you and speedy victory be with us. 

Yours very sincerely, 

J. R. Jellicoe. . 

At this same meeting Captain Evans handed the American 
commander another letter which was just as characteristic as 
that of Admiral Jellicoe. The following lines constitute our 
officers' first introduction to Vice-Admiral Bayly, the officer 
who was to command their operations in the next eighteen 
months, and, in its brevity, its entirely businesslike qualities, 
as well as in its genuine sincerity and kindness, it gave a fair 
introduction to the man : 

Admiralty House, 
Queenstown, 
4-5-17. 
Dear Commander Taussig: 

I hope that you and the other five officers in command of the 
U. S. destroyers in your flotilla will come and dine here to-night, 
Friday, at 7.45, and that you and three others will remain to sleep 



56 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

here so as to get a good rest after your long journey. Allow me to 
welcome you and to thank you for coming. 

Yours sincerely, 

Lewis Bayly. 
Dine in undress; no speeches. 

The first duty of the officers on arrival was to make the 
usual ceremonial calls. The Lord Mayor of Cork had come 
down from his city, which is only twelve miles from Queens- 
town, to receive the Americans, and now awaited them in the 
American consulate; and many other citizens were assembled 
there to welcome them. One of the most conspicuous 
features of the procession was the moving picture operator, 
whose presence really had an international significance. The 
British Government itself had detailed him for this duty; it 
regarded the arrival of our destroyers as a great historical 
event and therefore desired to preserve this animated record 
in the official archives. Crowds gathered along the street to 
watch and cheer our officers as they rode by; and at the 
consulate the Lord Mayor, Mr. Butterfield, made an elo- 
quent address, laying particular emphasis upon the close 
friendship that had always prevailed between the American 
and the Irish people. Other dignitaries made speeches 
voicing similar sentiments. This welcome concluded, Com- 
mander Taussig and his brother officers started up the steep 
hill that leads to Admiralty House, a fine and spacious old 
building. 

Here, following out the instructions of the Navy Depart- 
ment, they were to report to Vice-Admiral Bayly for duty. 
.It is doing no injustice to Sir Lewis to say that our men 
regarded this first meeting with some misgiving. The Ad- 
miral's reputation in the British navy was well known to 
them. They knew that he was one of the ablest officers in 
the service; but they had also heard that he was an extremely 
exacting man, somewhat taciturn in his manner, and not 
inclined to be over familiar with his subordinates — a man 
v/ho did not easily give his friendship or his respect, and alto- 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 57 

gether, in the anxious minds of these ambitious young 
Americans, he was a somewhat forbidding figure. And the 
appearance of the Admiral, standing in his doorway awaiting 
their arrival, rather accentuated these preconceptions. He 
was a medium-sized man, with somewhat swarthy, weather- 
beaten face and black hair just turning gray; he stood there 
gazing rather quizzically at the Americans as they came 
trudging up the hill, his hands behind his back, his bright 
eyes keenly taking in every detail of the men, his face not 
showing the slightest trace of a smile. This struck our young 
men at first as a somewhat grim reception ; the attitude of the 
Admiral suggested that he was slightly in doubt as to the 
value of his new recruits, that he was entirely willing to be 
convinced, but that only deeds and not fine speeches of 
greeting would convince him. Yet Admiral Bayly welcomed 
our men with the utmost courtesy and dignity and his face, 
as he began shaking hands, broke into a quiet, non-com- 
mittal smile; there was nothing about his manner that was 
effusive, there were no unnecessary words, yet there was a 
real cordiality that put our men at ease and made them feel at 
home in this strange environment. They knew, of course, 
that they had come to Ireland, not for social diversions, but 
for the serious business of fighting the Hun, and that indeed 
was the only thought which could then find place in Admiral 
Bayly's mind. Up to this time the welcome to the Americans 
had taken the form of lofty oratorical flights, with emphasis 
upon the blood ties of Anglo-Saxondom, and the significance 
to civilization of America and Great Britain fighting side by 
side; but this was not the kind of a greeting our men received 
from Admiral Bayly. The Admiral himself, with his some- 
what worn uniform and his lack of ceremony, formed a 
marked contrast to the official reception by the Lord Mayor 
and his suite in their insignia of office. Entirely character- 
istic also was the fact that, instead of making a long speech, 
he made no speech at all. His chief interest in the Americans 
at that time was the assistance which they were likely to 



58 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

bring to the Allied cause; after courteously greeting the 
ofificers, the first question he asked about these forces was: 

"When will you be ready to go to sea?" 

Even under the most favorable conditions that is an em- 
barrassing question to ask of a destroyer commander. There 
is no type of ship that is so chronically in need of overhauling. 
Even in peace times the destroyer usually has under way a 
long list of repairs; our first contingent had sailed without 
having had much opportunity to refit, and had had an 
extremely nasty voyage. The fact was that it had been 
rather severely battered up, although the flotilla was in 
excellent condition, considering its hard experience on the 
ocean and the six months of hard work which it had pre- 
viously had on our coast. One ship had lost its fire-room 
ventilator, another had had condenser troubles on the way 
across, and there had been other difficulties. Commander 
Taussig, however, had sized up Admiral Bayly as a man to 
whom it would be a tactical error to make excuses, and 
promptly replied : 

"We are ready now, sir, that is, as soon as we finish re- 
fuelling. Of ourse you know how destroyers are — always 
wanting something done to them. But this is war, and we 
are ready to make the best of things and go to sea im- 
mediately." 

The Admiral was naturally pleased with the spirit in- 
dicated by this statement, and, with his customary con- 
sideration for his juniors, said : 

" I will give you four days from the time of arrival. Will 
that be sufficient?" 

"Yes," answered Taussig, "that will be more than ample 
time." 

As we discovered afterward, the Admiral had a system of 
always "testing out" new men, and it is not improbable that 
this preliminary interview was a part of this process. 

During the period of preparation there were certain 
essential preliminaries: it was necessary to make and to 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 59 

receive many calls, a certain amount of tea drinking was in- 
evitable and there were many invitations to dinners and to 
clubs that could not be ignored. Our officers made a state 
visit to Cork, going up in Admiral Bayly's barge, and re- 
turned the felicitations of the Mayor and his retinue. 

Naturally both the Americans and their ships became objects 
of great interest to their new allies. It was, I think, the first 
time that a destroyer flotilla had ever visited Great Britain, 
and the very appearance of the vessels themselves aroused 
the greatest curiosity. They bore only a general resemblance 
to the destroyers of the British navy. The shape of their 
hulls, the number and location of smoke pipes, the positions 
of guns, torpedo tubes, bridges, deckhouse, and other details 
gave them quite a contrasting profile. The fact that they 
were designed to operate under different conditions from the 
British ships accounted for many of these divergences. We 
build our destroyers with the widest possible cruising radius; 
they are expected to go to the West Indies, to operate from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific, and in general to feel at home any- 
where in the great stretch of waters that surround our 
country. British destroyers, on the other hand, are in- 
tended to operate chiefly in the restricted waters around the 
British Isles, where the fuelling and refitting facilities are so 
extensive that they do not have to devote much space to 
supplies of this kind. The result is that our destroyers can 
keep the sea longer than the British; on the other hand, the 
British are faster than ours, and they can also turn more 
quickly. These differences were of course a subject of much 
discussion among the observers at Queenstown, and even of 
animated argument. Naturally, the interest of the de- 
stroyer officers of the two services in the respective merits of 
their vessels was very keen. They examined minutely all 
features that were new to them in the design and arrange- 
ment of guns, torpedoes, depth charges, and machines, freely 
exchanged information, and discussed proposed improve- 
jnents m the friendliest possible spirit. Strangely enough, 



6o THE VICTORY AT SEA 

although the American destroyers carried greater fuel 
supplies than the British, they were rather more dainty and 
graceful in their lines, a fact which inspired a famous retort 
which rapidly passed through the ranks of both navies. 

"You know," remarked a British officer to an American, 
"I like the British destroyers better than the American. 
They look so much sturdier. Yours seem to me rather 
feminine in appearance." 

"Yes," replied the American, "that's so, but you must 
remember what Kipling says, 'The female of the species is 
more deadly than the male.' " 

The work of the Americans really began on the Sunday 
which followed their arrival; by this time they had estab- 
lished cordial relations with Admiral Bayly and were pre- 
pared to trust themselves unreservedly in his hands. He 
summoned the officers on this Sunday morning and talked 
with them a few moments before they started for the sub- 
marine zone ; the time of their departure had been definitely 
fixed for the next day. In the matter of ceremonial greet- 
ings the Admiral was not strong, but when it came to 
discussing the business in hand he was the master of a con- 
vincing eloquence. The subject of his discourse was the re- 
sponsibility that lay before our men; he spoke in sharp, 
staccato tones, making his points with the utmost precision, 
using no verbal flourishes or unnecessary words — looking at 
our men perhaps a little fiercely, and certainly impressing 
them with the fact that the work which lay before them was 
to be no summer holiday. As soon as the destroyers passed 
beyond the harbor defences, the Admiral began, death 
constantly lay before the men until they returned. There 
was only one safe rule to follow; days and even weeks might 
go by without seeing a submarine, but the men must assume 
that one was constantly watching them, looking for a favorable 
opportunity to discharge its torpedo. "You must not relax 
attention for an instant, or you may lose an opportunity to 
destroy a submarine or give her a chance to destroy you." It 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 6i 

was the present intention to send the American destroyers 
out for periods of six days, giving them two days' rest be- 
tween trips, and about once a month they were to have five 
days in port for boiler cleaning. And now the Admiral gave 
some details about the practical work at sea. Beware, he 
said, about ramming periscopes ; these were frequently mere 
decoys for bombs and should be shelled. In picking up sur- 
vivors of torpedoed vessels the men must be careful not to 
stop until thoroughly convinced that there were no sub- 
marines in the neighborhood: "You must not risk the loss 
of your vessel in order to save the lives of a few people." 
The Admiral proclaimed the grim philosophy of this war 
when he told our men that it would be their first duty, should 
they see a ship torpedoed, not to go to the rescue of the sur- 
vivors, but to go after the submarine. The three imperative 
duties of the destroyers were, in the order named : first, to 
destroy submarines; second, to convoy and protect merchant 
shipping; and third, to save the lives of the passengers and 
crews of torpedoed ships. No commander should ever miss 
an opportunity to destroy a submarine merely because there 
were a few men and women in small boats or in the water 
who might be saved. Admiral Bayly explained that to do this 
would be false economy : sinking a submarine meant saving 
far more lives than might be involved in a particular in- 
stance, for this vessel, if spared, would simply go on con- 
stantly destroying human beings. The Admiral then gave a 
large number of instructions in short, pithy sentences: " Do 
not use searchlights; do not show any lights whatever at 
night; do not strike any matches; never steam at a slower 
rate than thirteen knots; always zigzag, thereby preventing 
the submarine from plotting your position; always approach 
a torpedoed vessel with the sun astern; make only short 
signals; do not repeat the names of vessels; carefully watch 
all fishing vessels — they may be submarines in disguise — they 
even put up masts, sails, and funnels in this attempt to con- 
ceal their true character." The Admiral closed his remarks 



62 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

with a warning based upon his estimate of the character and 
methods of the enemy. In substance he said that were it 
not for the violations of the dictates of humanity and the 
well-estabHshed chivalry of the sea, he would have the 
greatest respect for the German submarine commanders. 
He cautioned our officers not to underrate them, and par- 
ticularly emphasized their cleverness at what he termed 
"the art of irregularity." He explained this by saying that 
up to that time he had been unable to deduce from their 
operations any definite plan or tactics, and advised our 
commanders also to guard against any regularity of move- 
ment; they should never, for example, patrol from one corner 
to another of their assigned squares in the submarine zone, 
or adopt any other uniform practice which the enemy might 
soon perceive and of which he would probably take advant- 
age. 

At the very moment that Admiral Bayly was giving these 
impressive instructions the submarine campaign had reached 
its crisis; the fortunes of the Allies had never struck so low a 
depth as at that time. An incident connected with our ar- 
rival, not particularly important in itself, brought home to our 
men the unsleeping vigilance of the enemy with whom they 
had to deal. 

Perhaps the Germans did not actually have advance 
information of the arrival of this first detachment of our 
destroyers; but they certainly did display great skill in 
divining what was to happen. At least it was a remark- 
able coincidence that for the first time in many months a sub- 
marine laid a mine-field directly off the entrance to Queenstown 
the day before our ships arrived. Soon afterward a parent 
ship of the destroyers reached this port and encountered 
the same welcome; and soon after that a second parent ship 
found a similar mine-field awaiting her arrival. The news 
that our destroyers had reached Queenstown actually ap- 
peared in the German papers several days before we had 
released it in the British and American press. Thanks to 



RETURN OF ''MAYFLOWER'^ 6^ 

the vigilance and efficiency of the British minesweepers, 
however, the enemy gained nothing from: all these pfrepara- 
tions, for the channel was cleared of German mivtes before 
our vessels reached port. 

The night before the destroyers arrived, while some of the 
officers of my staff were dining with Admiral Bayly, the win- 
dows were shaken by heavy explosions made by the mines 
which the sweepers were dragging out. Admiral Bayly jok- 
ingly remarked that it was really a pity to interfere with such 
a warm welcome as had apparently been planned for our 
crusaders. Even the next night, while the destroyer officers 
were dining at Admiralty House, several odd mines exploded 
outside the Channel that had been swept the previous day. 
This again impressed our men with the fact that the game 
which they had now entered was quite a different affair 
from their peace-time manoeuvres. 

The Germans at that time were jubilant over the progress 
of their submarine campaign and, indeed, they had good 
reason to be. The week that our first flotilla reached Irish 
waters their submarines had destroyed 240,000 tons of Allied 
shipping; if the sinking should keep up at this rate, it meant 
losses of 1,000,000 tons a month and an early German 
victory. 

In looking over my letters of that period, I find many 
references that picture the state of the official mind. All 
that time I was keeping closely in touch with Ambassador 
Page who was energetically seconding all my efforts to bring 
more American ships across the Atlantic. 

"It remains a fact," I wrote our Ambassador, "that at 
present the enemy is succeeding and that we are fail- 
ing. Ships are being sunk faster than they can be re- 
placed by the building facilities of the world. This simply 
means that the enemy is winning the war. There is no 
mystery about that. The submarines are rapidly cutting the 
Allies' lines of communication. When they are cut, or suffi- 
ciently interfered with, we must accept the enemy's terms." 



64 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Six days before our destroyers put in at Queenstown I 
sent this message to Mr. Page: 

Allies do not now command the sea. Transport of troops and 
supplies strained to the utmost and the maintenance of the armies in 
the field is threatened. 

Such then was the situation when our little destroyer 
flotilla first went to sea to do battle with the submarine. 

II 

ADMIRAL SIR LEWIS BAYLY, who now became the 
L commander of the American destroyers at Queens- 
town, so far as their military operations were concerned, had 
spent fifty years in the British navy, forty years of this time 
actually at sea. This ripe experience, combined with a 
great natural genius for salt water, had made him one 
of the most efficient men in the service. In what I have 
already said, I may have given a slightly false impression 
of the man; that he was taciturn, that he was generally 
regarded as a hard taskmaster, that he never made friends 
at the first meeting, that he was more interested in results 
than in persons — all this is true; yet these qualities merely 
concealed what was, at bottom, a generous, kindly, and even a 
warm-hearted character. Admiral Bayly was so retiring and so 
modest that he seemed almost to have assumed these exterior 
traits to disguise his real nature. When our men first met 
the Admiral they saw a man who would exact their last effort 
and accept no excuses for failure; when admitted to more 
intimate association, however, they discovered that this 
weatherbeaten sailor had a great love for flowers, for children, 
for animals, for pictures, and for books; that he was deeply 
read in general literature, in history, and in science, and that 
he had a knowledge of their own country and its institutions 
which many of our own officers did not possess. Americans 
have great reason to be proud of the achievements of their 
naval men and one of the most praiseworthy was the fact 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 65 

that they became such intimate friends of Admiral Bayly. 
For this man's nature was so sincere that he could never 
bring himself to indulge in friendships which he deemed 
unworthy. Early in his association with our men, he told 
them bluntly that any success he and they might have in 
getting on together would depend entirely upon the manner 
in which they performed their work. If they acquitted them- 
selves creditably, well and good; if not, he should not hesitate 
to fmd fault with them. It is thus a tribute to our officers 
that in a very short time they and Admiral Bayly had 
established relations which were not only friendly but af- 
fectionate. Not long after our destroyers arrived at Queens- 
town most of the British destroyers left to reenforce the 
hard-driven flotillas in the Channel and the North Sea, so 
that the destroyer forces at Queenstown under Admiral 
Bayly became almost exclusively American, though they 
worked with many British vessels — sloops, trawlers, sweepers, 
and mystery ships, in cooperation with British destroyers 
and other vessels in the north and other parts of Ireland. 
The Admiral watched over our ships and their men with the 
jealous eye of a father. He always referred to his command 
as "my destroyers" and "my Americans," and woe to any 
one who attempted to interfere with them or do them the 
slightest injustice! Admiral Bayly would fight for them, 
against the combined forces of the whole British navy, 
like a tigress for her cubs. He constantly had a weather eye 
on Plymouth, the main base of the British destroyers, to 
see that the vessels from that station did their fair share 
of the work. Once or twice a dispute arose between an 
American destroyer commander and a British, in such 
cases Admiral Bayly vigorously took the part of the 
American. "You did perfectly right," he would say to our 
men, and then he would turn all his guns against the inter- 
fering Britisher. Relations between the young Americans 
and the experienced Admiral became so close that they 
would sometimes go to him with their personal troubles; 



66 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

he became not only their commander, but their confidant 
and adviser. 

There was something in these bright, young chaps from 
overseas, indeed, so different from anything which he had 
ever met before, that greatly appealed to this seasoned 
Englishman. One thing that he particularly enjoyed was 
their sense of humor. The Admiral himself had a keen wit 
and a love of stories; and he also had the advantage, which 
was not particularly common in England, of understanding 
American slang and American anecdotes. There are cer- 
tain stories which apparently only an upbringing on Ameri- 
can soil qualifies one to appreciate; yet Admiral Bayly 
always instantly got the point. He even took a certain pride 
in his ability to comprehend the American joke. One of 
the regular features of life at Queen stown was a group of 
retired British officers — ^fine, white-haired old gentlemen 
who could take no active part in the war but who used to 
find much consolation in coming around to smoke their 
pipes and to talk things over at Admiralty House. Admiral 
Bayly invariably found delight in encouraging our officers 
to entertain these rare old souls with American stories; their 
utter bewilderment furnished him endless entertainment. 
The climax of his pleasure came when, after such an ex- 
perience, the old men would get the Admiral in a comer, and 
whisper to him: "What in the world do they mean?" 

The Admiral was wonderfully quick at repartee, as our 
men found when they began "joshing" him on British pe- 
culiarities, for as naval attache he had travelled extensively 
in the United States, had observed most of our national 
eccentricities, and thus was able promptly "to come back." 
In such contests our men did not invariably come off with 
all the laurels. Yet, despite these modern tendencies, 
Admiral Bayly was a conservative of the conservatives, 
having that ingrained British respect for old things simply 
because they were old. An ancient British custom requires 
that at church on Sundays the leading dignitary in each 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 67 

community shall mount the reading desk and read the 
lessons of the day; Admiral Bayly would perform this office 
with a simplicity and a reverence which indicated the 
genuinely religious nature of the man. And in smaller de- 
tails he was likewise the ancient, tradition-loving Briton. 
He would never think of writing a letter to an equal or 
superior officer except in longhand; to use a typewriter for 
such a purpose would have been profanation in his eyes. I 
once criticised a certain Admiral for consuming an hour or 
so in laboriously penning a letter which could have been 
dictated to a stenographer in a few minutes. 

"How do you ever expect to win the war if you use up 
time this way?" I asked. 

" I'd rather lose the war," the Admiral replied, but with a 
twinkle in his eye, "than use a typewriter to my chiefs!" 

Our officers liked to chaff the Admiral quietly on this 
conservatism. He frequently had a number of them to 
breakfast, and upon one such occasion the question was 
asked as to why the Admiral ate an orange after breakfast, 
instead of before, as is the custom in America. 

" I can tell you why," said Commander Zogbaum. 

"Well, why is it?" asked the Admiral. 

" Because that's what William the Conqueror used to do." 

" 1 can think of no better reason than that for doing it," 
the Admiral promptly answered. But this remark tickled 
him immensely, and became a byword with him. Ever 
afterward, whenever he proposed to do something which the 
Americans regarded as too conservative, he would say: 

"You know that this is what William the Conqueror used 
to do!" 

Yet in one respect the Admiral was all American; he was 
a hard worker even to the point of hustle. He insisted on 
the strictest attention to the task in hand from his subordi- 
nates, but at least he never spared himself. After he had 
arrived at Queenstown, two years before our destroyers put 
in, he proceeded to reorganize Admiralty House on the 



68 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

most businesslike basis. The first thing he pounced upon 
was the bilHard room in the basement. He decided that it 
would make an excellent plotting room, and that the billiard 
tables could be transformed into admirable drawing boards 
for his staff; he immediately called the superintendent and 
told him to make the necessary transformations. 

"All right," said the superintendent. "We'll start work 
on them to-morrow morning." 

"No, you won't," Admiral Bayly replied. "We propose 
to be established in this room using these tables to-morrow 
morning. They must be all ready for use by eight o'clock." 

And he was as good as his word; the workmen spent the 
whole night making the changes. At the expense of con- 
siderable personal comfort he also caused one half of the 
parlor of Admiralty House to be partitioned off as an office 
and the wall thus formed covered with war maps. 

These incidents are significant, not only of Admiral Bayly's 
methods, but of his ideals. In his view, if a billiard room 
could be made to serve a war purpose, it had no proper place 
in an admiralty house v/hich was the headquarters for fighting 
German submarines. The chief duty of all men at that 
crisis was work, and their one responsibility was the defeat 
of the Hun. Admiralty House was always open to our 
officers; they spent many a delightful evening there around 
the Admiral's fire; they were constantly entertained at 
lunch and at dinner, and they were expected to drop in for 
tea whenever they were in port. But social festivities in the 
conventional sense were barred. No ladies, except the Ad- 
miral's relatives, ever visited the place. Some of the furnish- 
ings were rather badly worn, but the Admiral would make no 
requisitions for new rugs or chairs; every penny in the British 
exchequer, he insisted, should be used to fight the war. He 
was scornfully critical of any naval officers who made a 
lavish display of silver on their tables; money should be 
spent for depth charges, torpedoes, and twelve-inch shells, 
not for ostentation. He was scrupulousness itself in ob^ 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 69 

serving all official regulations in the matter of food and other 
essentials. 

For still another reason the Admiral made an ideal com- 
mander of American naval forces. He was a strict teeto- 
taler. His abstention was not a war measure; he had always 
had a strong aversion to alcohol in any form and had 
never drunk a cocktail or a brandy and soda in his life. 
Dinners at Admiralty House, therefore, were absolutely 
"dry," and in perfect keeping with Americao naval regu- 
lations. 

Though Admiral Bayly was not athletic — his outdoor 
games being limited to tip-and-run cricket in the Admiralty 
grounds, which he played with a round bat and a tennis 
ball — he was a man of wiry physique and a tireless walker. 
Indeed the most active young men in our navy had great 
difficulty in keeping pace with him. One of his favorite 
diversions on a Saturday afternoon was to take a group on a 
long hike in the beautiful country surrounding Queenstown ; 
by the time the party reached home, the Admiral, though 
sixty years old, was usually the freshest of the lot. I still 
vividly remember a long walk which I took with him in a 
pelting rain; I recall how keenly he enjoyed it and how 
young and nimble he seemed to be when we reached home, 
drenched to the skin. A steep hill led from the shore up to 
Admiralty House; Sir Lewis used to say that this was a 
valuable military asset — it did not matter how angry a 
man might be with him when he started for headquarters, 
by the time he arrived, this wearisome climb always had the 
effect of quieting his antagonism. The Admiral was fond 
of walking up this hill with our young officers; he himself 
usually reached the top as fresh as a daisy, while his juniors 
were frequently puffing for breath. 

He enjoyed testing out our men in other ways; nothing 
delighted him more than giving them hard jobs to do — 
especially when they accomplished the tasks successfully. 
One day he ordered one of our officers, Lieutenant-Com- 



70 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

mander Roger Williams, captain of the Duncan, a recent 
arrival at Queenstown, to cross the Irish Sea and bring back 
a ship. The joker lay in the fact that this man's destroyer 
had just come in with her steering gear completely out of 
commission — a circumstance which Admiral Bayly well 
understood. Many officers would have promptly asked to 
be excused on this ground, but not this determined Ameri- 
can. He knew that the Admiral was trying to "put some- 
thing over on him," and he rose to the occasion. The fact 
that Queenstown Harbor is long and narrow, not wide enough 
for a destroyer to turn around in, made Commander Wil- 
liams's problem still more difficult, but by cleverly using 
his engines, he succeeded in backing out — the distance re- 
quired was five miles; he took another mile and a half to turn 
his ship and then he went across the sea and brought back 
his convoy — all without any steering gear. This officer 
never once mentioned to the Admiral the difficulties under 
which he had worked, but his achievement completely won 
Sir Lewis's heart, and from that time this young man be- 
came one of his particular favorites. Indeed, it was the 
constant demonstration of this kind of fundamental char- 
acter in our naval men which made the Admiral admire 
them so. 

On occasions Admiral Bayly would go to sea himself — 
something quite unprecedented and possibly even reprehen- 
sible, for it was about the same thing as a commanding 
general going into the front-line trenches. But the Ad- 
miral believed that doing this now and then helped to 
inspire his men ; and, besides that, he enjoyed it — he was not 
made for a land sailor. He had as flagship a cruiser of about 
5,000 tons; he had a way of jumping on board without the 
slightest ceremony and taking a cruise up the west coast of 
Ireland. On occasion the Admiral would personally lead an 
expedition which was going to the relief of a torpedoed vessel, 
looking for survivors adrift in small boats. One day Ad- 
miral Bayly, Captain Pringle of the U.S.S. Melville, Captain 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER'' 71 

Campbell, the Englishman whose exploits with mystery 
ships had given him world-wide fame, and myself went out 
on the Active to watch certain experiments with depth 
charges. It was a highly imprudent thing to do, because 
a vessel of such draft was an excellent target for torpedoes, 
but that only added to the zest of the occasion from Ad- 
miral Bayly's point of view. 

"What a bag this would be for the Hun!" he chuckled. 
"The American Commander-in-Chief, the British Admiral 
commanding in Irish waters, a British and an American 
captain!" 

In our mind's eye we could see our picture in the Berlin 
papers, four distinguished prisoners standing in a row. 

A single fact shows with what consideration Admiral 
Bayly treated his subordinates. The usual naval regula- 
tion demands that an officer, coming in from a trip, shall 
immediately seek out his commander and make a verbal 
report. Frequently the men came in late in the evening, 
extremely fatigued; to make the visit then was a hardship 
and might deprive them of much-needed sleep. Admiral 
Bayly therefore had a fixed rule that such visits should be 
made at ten o'clock of the morning following the day of 
arrival. On such occasions he would often be found seated 
somewhat grimly behind his desk wholly absorbed in the 
work in hand. If he were writing or reading his mail he 
would keep steadily at it, never glancing up until he had 
finished. He would listen to the report stoically, possibly 
say a word of praise, and then turn again to the business in 
hand. Occasionally he would notice that his abruptness 
had perhaps pained the young American; then he would 
break into an apologetic smile, and ask him to come up to 
dinner that evening, and even — ^this was the greatest honor 
of all — to spend the night at Admiralty House. 

These dinners were great occasions for our men, partic- 
ularly as they were presided over by Miss Voysey, the Ad- 
miral's niece. Miss Voysey, the little spaniel, Patrick, and 



72 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the Admiral constituted the "family," and the three were 
entirely devoted to one another. Pat in particular was an 
indispensable part of this menage; I have never seen any 
object quite so crestfallen and woe-begone as this little dog 
when either Miss Voysey or the Admiral spent a day or two 
away from the house. Miss Voysey was a young woman of 
great personal charm and cultivation; probably she was the 
influence that most contributed to the happiness and com- 
fort of our officers at Queenstown. From the day of their 
arrival she entered into the closest comradeship with the 
Americans. She kept open house for them : she was always 
on hand to serve tea in the afternoon, and she never over- 
looked an opportunity to add to their well being. As a 
result of her delightful hospitality Admiralty House really 
became a home for our oificers. Miss Voysey had a genuine 
enthusiasm for America and Americans; possibly the fact 
that she was herself an Australian made her feel like one of 
us ; at any rate, there were certain qualities in our men that 
she found extremely congenial, and she herself certainly won 
all their hearts. Any one who wishes to start a burst of en- 
thusiasm from our officers who were stationed at Queens- 
town need only to mention the name of Miss Voysey. The 
dignity with which she presided over the Admiral's house, 
and the success with which she looked out for his comfort, 
also inspired their respect. Miss Voysey was the leader in 
all the war charities at Queenstown and she and the Admiral 
made it their personal duty to look out for the victims of 
torpedoed ships. At whatever hour these survivors ar- 
rived they were sure of the most warm-hearted attentions 
from headquarters. In a large hall in the Custom House at 
the landing the Admiral kept a stock of cigarettes and 
tobacco, and the necessary gear and supplies for making and 
serving hot coffee at short notice, and nothing ever prevented 
him and his people from stationing themselves there to greet 
and serve the survivors as soon as they arrived — often wet 
and cold, and sometimes wounded. Even though the Ad- 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 73 

miral might be at dinner he and Miss Voysey would leave their 
meal half eaten and hurry to the landing to welcome the 
survivors. The Admiral and his officers always insisted on 
serving them, and they would even wash the dishes and put 
them away for the next time. The Admiral, of course, might 
have ordered others to do this work, but he preferred to give 
this personal expression of a real seaman's sympathy for 
other seamen in distress. It is unnecessary to say that any 
American officers who could get there in time always lent 
a hand. I am sure that long after most of the minor in- 
cidents of this war have faded from my memory, I shall still 
keep a vivid recollection of this kindly gentleman, Admiral 
Sir Lewis Bayly, K.C.B., K.C.M.G., C.V.O., Royal Navy, 
serving coffee to wretched British, American, French, Italian, 
Japanese, or Negro sailors, with a cheering word for each, 
and afterward, with sleeves tucked up, calmly washing dishes 
in a big pan of hot water. 

I have my fears that the Admiral will not be particularly 
pleased by the fact that I have taken all these pains to intro- 
duce him to the American public. Excessive modesty is one 
of his most conspicuous traits. When American correspond- 
ents came to Queenstown, Admiral Bayly would receive them 
courteously. "You can have all you want about the navy," 
he would say, "but remember — not a word about Lewis 
Bayly." He was so reticent that he was averse to having 
his picture taken ; even the moving picture operator detailed 
to get an historic record of the arrival of our destroyers did 
not obtain a good view of the Admiral, for whenever Sir 
Lewis saw him coming he would turn his back to the camera ! 
My excuse for describing this very lovable man, however, is 
because he became almost an object of veneration to our 
American officers, and because, since for eighteen months 
he was the commander of the American forces based on 
Queenstown, he is an object of legitimate interest to the 
American people. The fact that the Admiral was generally 
known to our officers as "Uncle Lewis," and that some of 



74 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

those who grew to know him best even called him that to his 
face, illustrates the delightful relations which were estab- 
lished. Any account of the operations of our navy in the 
European War would thus be sadly incomplete which 
ignored the splendid sailor who was largely responsible for 
their success. 

Another officer who contributed greatly to the efficiency 
of the American forces was Captain E. R. G. R. Evans, R.N., 
who was detailed by Admiral Jellicoe at my request to act as 
liaison officer with our destroyers. No more fortunate selec- 
tion could have been made. Captain Evans had earned 
fame as second in command of the Scott Antarctic expedition ; 
he had spent much time in the United States and knew our 
people well; indeed when war broke out he was lecturing in 
our country on his polar experiences. A few days before our 
division arrived Captain Evans had distinguished himself 
in one of the most brilliant naval actions of the war. He 
was commander of the destroyer-leader Broke — a "destroyer- 
leader" being a destroyer of unusually large size — and in 
this battle three British vessels of this type had fought six 
German destroyers. Captain Evans' ship sank one German 
destroyer and rammed another, passing clear over its stern 
and cutting it nearly in two. The whole of England was 
ringing with this exploit, and it was a decided tribute to our 
men that Admiral Jellicoe consented to detail the com- 
mander of the Broke. He was a man of great intelligence, 
great energy, and, what was almost equally to the point, he 
was extremely companionable; whether he was relating his 
experiences at the South Pole, or telling us of active life on a 
destroyer, or swapping yarns with our officers, or giving us 
the value of his practical experiences in the war. Captain 
Evans was always at home with our men — indeed, he seemed 
to be almost one of us. 

The fact that these American destroyers were placed under 
the command of a British Admiral was somewhat displeasing 
to certain Americans. I remember that one rather bump- 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 75 

tious American correspondent, on a visit to Queenstown, was 
loud in expressing his disapproval of this state of affairs, and 
even threatened to "expose" us all in the American press. 
The fact that I was specifically commissioned as destroyer 
commander also confused the situation. Yet the procedure 
was entirely proper, and, in fact, absolutely necessary. My 
official title was "Commander of the U. S. Naval Forces 
Operating in European Waters"; besides this, I was the 
representative of our Navy Department at the British 
Admiralty and American member of the Allied Naval 
Council. These duties required my presence in London, 
which became the centre of all our operations. I was com- 
mander not only of our destroyers at Queenstown, but of a 
destroyer force at Brest, another at Gibraltar, of subchaser 
forces at Corfu and Plymouth, of a mixed force at the Azores, 
of the American battle squadrons at Scapa Flow and Bere- 
haven, Ireland, certain naval forces at Murmansk and 
Archangel in north Russia and of many other contingents. 
Clearly it was impossible for me to devote all my time 
exclusively to any one of these commands; so far as actual- 
operations were concerned it was necessary that particular 
commanders should control them. All these destroyer 
squadrons, including that at Queenstown, were under the 
command of the American admiral stationed in London; 
whenever they sailed from Queenstown on specific duty, 
however, they sailed under orders from Admiral Bayly. 
Any time, however, I could withdraw these destroyers from 
Queenstown and send them where the particular necessities 
required. My position, that is, was precisely the same as 
that of General Pershing in France. He sent certain 
American divisions to the British army; as long as they 
acted with the British they were subject to the orders of Sir 
Douglas Haig; but General Pershing could withdraw these 
men at any time for use elsewhere. The actual supreme 
command of all our forces, army and navy, rested in the 
hands of Americans; but, for particular operations, they 



76 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

naturally had to take their orders from the particular officer 
under whom they were stationed. 

Ill 

ON MAY 17th a second American destroyer flotilla of 
six ships arrived at Queenstown. From that date until 
July 5th a new division put in nearly every week. The six 
destroyers which escorted our first troopships from America 
to France were promptly assigned to duty with our forces in 
Irish waters. Meanwhile other ships were added. On 
May 22nd the Melville, the "Mother Ship" of the destroyers, 
arrived and became the flagship of all the American vessels 
which were stationed at Queenstown. This repair and sup- 
plyrship practically took the place of a dockyard, so far as 
our destroyer forces were concerned. Queenstown had been 
almost abandoned as a navy yard many years before the 
European War and its facilities for the repair of warships 
were consequently very inadequate. The Melville relieved 
the British authorities of many responsibilities of this kind. 
She was able to do three quarters of all this work, except 
major repairs and those which required docking. Her 
resources for repairing destroyers, and for providing for the 
wants and comforts of our men, aroused much admiration in 
British naval circles. The rapidity with which our forces 
settled down to work, and the seamanly skill which they 
manifested from the very beginning, likewise made the most 
favorable impression. By July 5th we had thirty-four 
destroyers at Queenstown — a force that remained practically 
at that strength until November. In 19 18 much of the work 
of patrolling the seas and of convoying ships to the west and 
south of Ireland — the area which, in many ways, was the 
most important field of submarine warfare — ^fell upon these 
American ships. The officers and crews began this work 
with such zest that by June ist I was justified in making 
the following statement to the Navy Department: "It is 
gratifying to be able to report that the operations of our 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 77 

forces in these waters have proved not only very satisfactory, 
but also of marked value to the Allies in overcoming the 
submarine menace. The equipment and construction of 
our ships have proved adequate and sufficient and the per- 
sonnel has shown an unusually high degree of enthusiasm 
and ability to cope with the situation presented." 

It is impossible to exaggerate the enthusiasm which the 
arrival of these vessels produced upon the British public. 
America itself experienced something of a thrill when the 
news was first published that our destroyers had reached 
European waters, but this was mild compared with the joy 
which spread all over the British Isles. The feeling of Am- 
ericans was mainly one of pride; our people had not yet suf- 
fered much from the European cataclysm, and despite the 
fact that we were now active participants, the war still 
seemed very far off and unreal. The fact that a German 
victory would greatly endanger our national freedom had 
hardly entered our national consciousness; the idea seemed 
dim, abstract, perhaps even absurd; but in Great Britain, 
with the guns constantly booming almost within earshot of 
the people, the horrors of the situation were acutely realized. 
For this reason those American destroyers at Queenstown 
immediately became a symbol in the minds of the British 
people. They represented not only the material assistance 
which our limitless resources and our almost inexhaustible 
supply of men would bring to a cause which was really in 
desperate straits; but they stood also for a great spiritual 
fact; for the kinship of the two great Anglo-Saxon peoples, 
which, although separated politically, had now joined hands 
to fight for the ideals upon which the civilization of both na- 
tions rested. In the preceding two years Great Britain had 
had her moments of doubt — doubt as to whether the Am- 
erican people had remained true to the principles that formed 
the basis of their national life; the arrival of these ships im- 
mediately dispelled all such misgivings. 

Almost instinctively the minds of the British people turned 



78 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

to the day, nearly three hundred years before, when the 
Mayflower sailed for the wilderness beyond the seas. The 
moving picture film, which depicted the arrival of our first 
destroyer division, and which was exhibited all over Great 
Britain to enthusiastic crowds, cleverly accentuated this idea. 
This film related how, in 1620, a few Englishmen had landed 
in North America; how these adventurers had laid the 
foundations of a new state based on English conceptions of 
justice and liberty; how they had grown great and prosper- 
ous; how the stupidity of certain British statesmen had 
forced them to declare their independence; how they had 
fought for this independence with the utmost heroism; how 
out of these disjointed British colonies they had founded 
one of the mightiest nations of history; and how now, when 
the liberties of mankind were endangered, the descendants of 
the old Mayflower pioneers had in their turn crossed the 
ocean — this time going eastward — to fight for the traditions 
of their race. Had Americans been making this film, 
they would have illustrated another famous episode in 
our history that antedated, by thirteen years, the voyage 
of the Mayflower — that is, the landing of British colonists in 
Virginia, in 1607; but in the minds of the English people the 
name Mayflower had become merely a symbol of American 
progress and all that it represented. This whole story ap- 
pealed to the British masses as one of the great miracles of 
history — a single, miserable little settlement in Massachusetts 
Bay expanding into a continent overflowing with resources 
and wealth; a shipload of men, women, and children develop- 
ing, in less than three centuries, into a nation of more than 
100,000,000 people. And the arrival of our destroyers, pic- 
tured on the film, informed the British people that all this youth 
and energy had been thrown upon their side of the battle. 

One circumstance gave a particular appropriateness to 
the fact that I commanded these forces. In 19 10 I had 
visited England as captain of the battleship Minnesota, a 
iinit in a fleet which was then cruising in British and French 



RETURN OF "MAYTLOWER" 7^ 

waters. It was apparent even at that time that preparations 
were under way for a European war; on every hand there 
were plenty of evidences that Germany was determined to 
play her great stroke for the domination of the world. In 
a report to the Admiral commanding our division I gave it 
as my opinion that the great European war would begifl 
within four years. In a speech at the Guildhall, where 806^ 
of our sailors were entertained at lunch by the Lord MayorV 
Sir Vezey Strong, I used the words which involved me in 
a good deal of trouble at the time and which have been much 
quoted since. The statement then made was purely the in- 
spiration of the moment ; it came from the heart, not from the 
head; probably the evidences that Germany was stealthily 
preparing her great blow had something to do with my 
outburst. I certainly spoke without any authorization from 
my government, and realized at once that I had committed 
a great indiscretion. "If the time should ever come," I 
said, "when the British Empire is menaced by a European 
coalition, Great Britain can rely upon the last ship, the last 
dollar, the last man, and the last drop of blood of her kindred 
beyond the sea." It is not surprising that the appearance of 
American ships, commanded by the American who had 
spoken these words seven years before, strongly appealed to 
the British sense of the dramatic. Indeed, it struck the 
British people as a particularly happy fulfilment of prophecy. 
These sentences were used as an introduction to the moving 
picture film showing the arrival of our first destroyer division, 
and for weeks after reaching England I could hardly pick 
up a newspaper without these words of my Guildhall speech 
staring me in the face. 

Of course, any American admiral then commanding 
American naval forces in European waters would have been 
acclaimed as the living symbol of Anglo-American coopera- 
tion; and it was simply as the representative of the American 
people and the American navy that the British people re- 
ceived me so appreciatively. At first the appearance of our 



8o THE VICTORY AT SEA 

uniforms aroused much curiosity; our tightly fitting blouses 
were quite different from the British sack coats, and few 
people in London, in fact, knew who we were. After our 
photographs had appeared in the press, however, the people 
always recognized us on the streets. And then something 
quite unusual happened. That naval and military men 
should salute my staff and me was to have been expected 
but that civilians should show this respect for the American 
uniform was really unprecedented. Yet we were frequently 
greeted in this way. It indicated, almost more than any- 
thing else, how deeply affected the British people were by 
America's entrance into the war. All classes and all ages 
showed this same respect and gratitude to our country. 
Necessarily I had to attend many public dinners and even 
to make many speeches ; the people gathered on such occa- 
sions always rose en masse as a tribute to the uniform which 
I wore. Sometimes such meetings were composed of boy 
scouts, of school boys or school girls, of munition workers, 
of journalists, or of statesmen; and all, irrespective of age or 
social station or occupation, seemed delighted to pay respect 
to the American navy. There were many evidences of in- 
terest in the "American Admiral" that were really affecting. 
Thus one day a message came from Lady Roberts, widow 
of the great soldier. Field Marshal Earl Roberts, saying that 
she was desirous of meeting the "American Admiral." I 
was very glad to go out in the country and spend a Sunday 
afternoon with her. This charming, white-haired old lady 
was very feeble, and had to spend most of her time in a 
wheelchair. But her mind was bright as ever, and she had 
been following the war with the closest attention. She 
listened with keen Interest as I told her all about the sub- 
marines, and she asked innumerable questions concerning 
them. She was particularly affected when she spoke about 
the part the United States was playing in the war, and 
remarked how much our participation would have delighted 
the Field Marshal. 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 8i 

I have already given my first impressions of Their Majes- 
ties the King and Queen, and time only confirmed them. 
Neither ever missed an opportunity to show their apprecia- 
tion of the part that we were playing. The zeal with which 
the King entered into the celebration of our Fourth of July 
made him very popular with all our men. He even cul- 
tivated a taste for our national game. Certain of our early 
contingents of soldiers encamped near Windsor; here they 
immediately laid out a baseball diamond and daily engaged 
in their favorite sport. The royal family used to watch 
our men at their play, became interested in the game, and 
soon learned to follow it. The Duke of Connaught and the 
Princess Patricia, his daughter, had learned baseball through 
their several years' residence in Canada, and could watch a 
match with all the understanding and enthusiasm of an 
American "fan." As our sailors and soldiers arrived in 
greater numbers, the interest and friendliness of the royal 
family increased. One of the King's most delightful traits 
is his sense of humor. The Queen also showed a great fond- 
ness for stories, and I particularly remember her amusement 
at the famous remark of the Australians — perhaps the most, 
ferocious combatants on the Western Front — about the 
American soldier, "a good fighter, but a little rough." Of 
all the anecdotes connected with our men, none delighted 
King George so much as those concerning our colored 
troops. A whole literature of Negro yarns spread rapidly 
over Europe; most of them, I find, have long since reached 
the United States. The most lasting impression which I 
retain of the head of the British Empire is that he is very 
much of a human being. He loved just about the same 
things which the normal American or Englishman loves — 
his family, his friends, his country, a good story, a pleasant 
evening with congeniaf associates. And he had precisely 
the same earnestness about the war which one found in 
every properly constituted Briton or American; the victories 
of the Allies exhilarated King George just as they exhila- 



82 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

rated the man in the street, and their defeats saddened him 
just as they saddened the humblest citizen. I found in His 
Majesty that same solemn sense of comradeship with 
America which I found in the English civilians who saluted 
the American uniform on the street. 

As an evidence of the exceedingly cordial relations existing 
between the two navies the Admiralty proposed, in the latter 
part of May, that I should assume Admiral Bayly's com- 
mand for several days while he took a little vacation on the 
west coast of Ireland. Admiral Bayly was the Commander- 
in-Chief of all the British forces operating on the Irish coast. 
This command thus included far more than that at Queens- 
town; it comprised several naval stations and the consider- 
able naval forces in Irish waters. Never before, so I was 
informed, had a foreign naval officer commanded British 
naval forces in time of war. So far as exercising any control 
over sea operations was concerned, this invitation was not 
particularly important. Matters were running smoothly 
at the Queenstown station; Admiral Bayly's second in com- 
mand could easily have kept the machine in working order; 
it was hardly likely, in the few days that I was to command, 
that any changes in policy would be initiated. The British 
Admiralty merely took this way of showing a great courtesy 
to the American navy, and of emphasizing to the world the 
excellent relations that existed between the two services. 
The act was intended to symbolize the fact that the British 
and the American navies were really one in the thoroughness 
of their cooperation in subduing the Prussian menace. In- 
cidentally the British probably hoped that the publication 
of this news in the German press would not be without effect 
in Germany. On June i8th, therefore, I went to Queenstown, 
^nd hoisted my flag on the staff in front of Admiralty House. 
I had some hesitation in doing this, for American navy 
regulations stipulate that an Admiral's flag shall be raised 
only on a ship afloat, but Admiral Bayly was insistent that 
his flag should pome down and that mine should go up, and 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 83 

I decided that this technicality might be waived. The in- 
cident aroused great interest in England, but it started many 
queer rumors in Queenstown. One was that Admiral 
Bayly and I had quarreled, the British Admiral, strangely 
enough, having departed in high dudgeon and left me 
serenely in control. Another was that 1 had come to Queens- 
town, seized the reins out of Admiral Bayly's hands, thrown 
him out of the country, and taken over the government of 
Ireland on behalf of the United States, which had now de- 
termined to free the island from British oppression! How- 
ever, in a few days Admiral Bayly returned and all went on 
as before. 

/During the nearly two years which the American naval 
forces spent in Europe only one element in the population 
showed them any hostility or even unfriendliness. At the 
moment when these lines are being written a delegation 
claiming to represent the "Irish Republic" is touring the 
United States, asking Americans to extend their sympathy 
and contribute money toward the realization of their project. 
I have great admiration for the mass of the Irish people, and 
from the best elements of these people the American sailors 
received only kindness. I have therefore hesitated about 
telling just how some members of the Sinn Fein Party treated 
our men. But it seems that now when this same brother- 
hood is attempting to stir up hatred in this country 
against our Allies in the war, there is a certain perti- 
nence in informing Americans just what kind of treatment 
their brave sailors met with at the hands of the Sinn Fein in 
Ireland. 

, The people of Queenstown and Cork, as already described, 
received our men with genuine Irish cordiality. Yet in a 
few weeks evidence of hostility in certain quarters became 
apparent. The fact is that the part of Ireland in which the 
Americans were stationed was a headquarters of the Sinn 
Fein. The members of this organization were not only 
openly disloyal; they were openly pro-German. They were 



84 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

not even neutral; they were working day and night for a 
German victory, for in their misguided minds a German vic- 
tory signified an I rish RepubHc. 1 1 was no secret that the Sinn 
Feiners were sending information to Germany and con- 
stantly laying plots to interfere with the British and Amer- 
ican navies. At first it might be supposed that the large 
number of sailors — and some officers — of Irish extraction 
on the American destroyers would tend to make things easier 
for our men. Quite the contrary proved to be the case. The 
Sinn Feiners apparently believed that these so-called Irish- 
Americans would sympathize with their cause; in their wild- 
est moments they even hoped that our naval forces might 
champion it. But these splendid sailors were Americans 
before they were anything else; their chief ambition was the 
defeat of the Hun and they could not understand how any 
man anywhere could have any other aim in life. They were 
disgusted at the large numbers of able-bodied men whom they 
saw on the streets, and did not hesitate to ask some of them 
why they were not fighting on the Western Front. ) [The be- 
havior of the American sailors was good; but the mere fact 
that they did not openly manifest a hatred of Great Britain 
and a love of Germany infuriated the Sinn Feiners. And 
the eternal woman question also played its part. Our men 
had much more money than the native Irish boys, and could 
entertain the girls more lavishly at the movies and ice-cream 
stands. The men of our fleet and the Irish girls became ex- 
cellent friends; the association, from our point of view, was 
a very wholesome one, for the moral character of the Irish 
girls of Queenstown and Cork — as indeed, of Irish girls 
everywhere — is very high, and their companionship added 
greatly to the wellbeing and contentment of our sailors, not 
a few of whom found wives among these young women. 
But when the Sinn Fein element saw their sweethearts de- 
serting them for the American boys their hitherto sup- 
pressed anger took the form of overt acts. 
Occasionally an American sailor would be brought from 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 85 

Cork to Queenstown in a condition that demanded pressing 
medical attention. When he regained consciousness he 
would relate how he had suddenly been set upon by half a 
dozen roughs and beaten into a state of insensibility. Several 
of our men were severely injured in this way. At other 
times small groups were stoned by Sinn Fein sympathizers and 
there were many hostile demonstrations in moving picture 
houses and theatres. Even more frequently attacks were 
made, not upon the American sailors, but upon the Irish 
girls who accompanied them. These chivalrous pro-German 
agitators would rush up and attempt to tear the girls away 
from our young men ; they would pull down their hair, slap 
them, and even kick them. Naturally American sailors 
were hardly the type to tolerate behavior of this kind, and 
some bloody battles took place. This hostility "was in- 
creased by one very regrettable occurrence in Queenstown. 
An American sailor was promenading the main thorough- 
fare with an Irish girl, when an infuriated Sinn Feiner rushed 
up, began to abuse his former sweetheart in vile language, 
and attempted to lay Itands on her. The American struck 
this hooligan a terrific blow; he fell backward and struck his 
head on the curb. The fall fractured the assailant's skull 
and in a few hours he was dead. We handed our man over 
to the civil authorities for trial, and a jury, composed entirely 
of Irishmen, acquitted him. The action of this jury in it- 
self indicated that there was no sympathy among the decent 
Irish element, which constituted the great majority, with 
this sort of tactics, but naturally it did not improve relations 
between our men and the Sinn Fein.J^-The importance of 
another incident which took place at the cathedral has been 
much exaggerated. It is true that a priest in his Sunday 
sermon denounced the American sailors as vandals and be- 
trayers of Irish womanhood, but it is also true that the 
Roman Catholics of that section were themselves the most 
enraged at this absurd proceeding. A number of Roman 
Catholic officers who were present left the church in a body; 



86 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the Catholic Bishop of the Diocese called upon Admiral 
Bayly and apologized for the insult, and he also punished 
the offending priest by assigning him to new duties at a con- 
siderable distance from the American ships.) 
; But even more serious trouble was brewifig, for our officers 
discovered that the American sailors were making elaborate 
plans to protect themselves. Had this discovery not been 
made in time, something like an international incident 
might have resulted. Much to our regret, therefore, it was 
found necessary to issue an order that no naval men, British 
or American, under the rank of Commander, should be per- 
mitted to go to Cork. Ultimately we had nearly 8,000 
American men at this station ; Queenstown itself is a small 
place of 6,000 or 7,000, so it is apparent that it did not possess 
the facilities for giving such a large number of men those 
relaxations which were necessary to their efficiency. We 
established a club in Queenstown, provided moving pictures 
and other entertainments, and did the best we could to keep 
our sailors contented. The citizens of Cork also keenly 
regretted our action. The great majority had formed a real 
fondness for our boys; and they regarded it as a great humili- 
ation that the rowdy element had made it necessary to keep 
our men out of their city. Many letters were printed in the 
Cork newspapers apologizing to the Americans and calling 
upon the people to take action that would justify us in re- 
scinding our order. The loss to Cork tradesmen was great ; 
our men received not far from ^200,000 to ^300,000 a month 
in pay; they were free spenders, and their presence in the 
neighborhood for nearly two years would have meant a 
fortune to many of the local merchants. Yet we were 
obliged to refuse to accede to the numerous requests that the 
American sailors be permitted to visit this city. 

A committee of distinguished citizens of Cork, led by the 
Lord Mayor, came to Admiralty House to plead for the re- 
scinding of this order. Admiral Bayly cross-examined them 
very sharply. It appeared that the men who had com- 



RETURN OF "MAYFLOWER" 87 

mitted these offenses against American sailors had never been 
punished. 

Unless written guarantees were furnished that there would 
be no hostile demonstrations against British or Americans, 
Admiral Bayly refused to withdraw the ban and I fully 
concurred in this decision. Unfortunately the committee 
could give no such guarantee. We knew very well that the 
first appearance of Americans in Cork would be the signal 
for a renewal of hostilities, and the temper of our sailors was 
such that the most deplorable consequences might have 
resulted. We even discovered that the blacksmiths on the 
U.S.S. Melville were surreptitiously manufacturing weap- 
ons which our men could conceal on their persons and with 
which they proposed to sally forth and do battle with the 
Sinn Fein ! So for the whole period of our stay in Queens- 
town our sailors were compelled to keep away from the 
dangerous city. But the situation was not without its 
humorous aspects. Thus the pretty girls of Cork, finding 
that the Americans could not come to them, decided to come 
to the Americans; every afternoon a trainload would arrive 
at the Queenstown station, where our sailors would greet 
them, give them a splendid time, and then, in the evening, 
escort them to the station and send a happy crowd on their 
way home. 

X^But the Sinn Feiners interfered with us in much more serl- 
ious ways than this. They were doing everything in their 
power to help Germany. With their assistance German 
agents and German spies were landed in Ireland. At one 
time the situation became so dangerous that I had to take 
experienced officers whose services could ill be spared from 
our destroyers and assign them to our outlying air stations 
in Ireland. This, of course, proportionately weakened our 
fleet and did its part in prolonging the war./ 



CHAPTER III 
THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 

I 

A LL this time that we were seeking a solution for the 
/\ submarine problem we really had that solution in 
/ \ our hands. The seas presented two impressive 
J, jL spectacles in those terrible months of April, May, 
and June, 19 1 7. One was the comparative ease with which the 
German submarines were sinking merchant vessels; the other 
was their failure materially to weaken the Allied fleets. If 
we wish a counter picture to that presented by the Irish Sea 
and the English Channel, where merchant shipping was 
constantly going down, we should look to the North Sea, 
where the British Grand Fleet, absolutely intact, was de- 
fiantly riding the waves. The uninformed public explained 
this apparent security in a way of its own; it believed that 
the British dreadnaughts were anchored behind booms, 
nets, and mine-fields, through which the submarines could 
not penetrate. Yet the fact of the matter was that the 
Grand Fleet was frequently cruising in the open sea, in the 
waters which were known to be the most infested with sub- 
marines. The German submarines had been attempting to 
destroy this fleet for two and one half years. It had been 
their plan to weaken this great battle force by "attrition"; 
to sink the great battleships one by one, and in this way to 
reduce the fighting power of the fleet to such a point that the 
German dreadnaughts could have some chances of success. 
Such had been the German programme, widely heralded at the 
beginning of the war; nearly three years had now passed, 
but how had this pretentious scheme succeeded? The fact 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 89 

was that the submarines had not destroyed a single dread- 
naught. It was certainly a profitable study in contrasts — 
that of merchant ships constantly being torpedoed and that 
of battleships constantly repelling such attacks. Certainly 
a careful study of this situation ought to bring out facts 
which would assist the Allies in solving the most baffling 
problem of the war. 

Yet there was no mystery about the immunity which 
these great fighting vessels were enjoying; the submarine 
problem, so far as it affected the battle fleet, had already 
been solved. The explanation was found in the simple 
circumstance that, whenever the dreadnaughts went to 
sea, they were preceded by a screen of cruisers and de- 
stroyers. It almost seemed as though these surface craft 
were serving as a kind of impenetrable wall against which 
the German U-boats were beating themselves in vain. Yet 
to the casual observer there seemed to be no reason why the 
submarines should stand in any particular terror of the 
destroyers. Externally they looked like the least impressive 
war vessels afloat. When they sailed ahead of the battle 
squadrons, the destroyers were ungraceful objects upon the 
surface of the water; the impression which they conveyed was 
that of fragility rather than of strength, and the idea that they 
could ever be the guardians of the mighty battleships which 
sailed behind them at first seemed almost grotesque. Yet 
these little vessels really possessed the power of overcoming 
the submarine. The war had not progressed far when it 
became apparent that the U-boat could not operate any- 
where near this speedy little surface vessel without running 
serious risk of destruction. 

Until the reports of submarine fighting began to find their 
way into the papers, however, the destroyer was probably 
the one type of warship in which the public had the smallest 
interest. It had become, indeed, a kind of ugly duckling 
of the Navy. Our Congress had regularly neglected it; 
year after year our naval experts had recommended that 



go THE VICTORY AT SEA 

four destroyers be built for every battleship, and annually 
Congress had appropriated for only one or two. The war 
had also found Great Britain without a sufficient number of 
destroyers for the purpose of anti-submarine warfare. The 
Admiralty had provided enough for screening the Grand Fleet 
in cruising and in battle, but it had been called upon to divert 
so many for the protection of troop transportation, supply 
ships, and commerce generally that the efficiency of the fleet 
had been greatly undermined. Thus Britain found herself 
without enough destroyers to meet the submarine campaign; 
this situation was not due to any lack of foresight, but to a 
failure to foresee that any civilized nation could ever employ 
the torpedo in unrestricted warfare against merchant ships 
and their crews. 

The one time that this type of vessel had come prominently 
into notice was in 1904, when several of them attacked the 
Russian fleet at Port Arthur, damaging several powerful 
vessels and practically ending Russian sea power in the Far 
East. The history of the destroyer, however, goes back 
much further than 1904. It was created to fulfill a duty not 
unlike that which it has played so gloriously in the World 
War. In the late 'seventies and early 'eighties a new type 
of war vessel, the torpedo boat, caused almost as much 
perturbation as the submarine has caused in recent years. 
This speedy little fighter was invented to serve as a me- 
dium for the discharge of a newly perfected engine of naval 
warfare, the automobile torpedo. It was its function to 
creep up to a battleship, preferably under cover of dark- 
ness or in thick weather, and let loose this weapon against 
her unsuspecting hulk. The appearance of the torpedo 
boat led to the same prediction as that which has been 
more recently inspired by the submarine; in the eyes of 
many it simply meant the end of the great surface battle- 
ship. But naval architects, looking about for the "answer" 
to this dangerous craft, designed another type of warship 
and appropriately called it the "torpedo boat destroyer." 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 91 

This vessel was not only larger and speedier than its ap- 
pointed antagonist, but it possessed a radius of action 
and a seaworthiness which enabled it to accompany the 
battle fleet. Its draft was so light that a torpedo could 
pass harmlessly under the keel, and it carried an armament 
which had sufficient power to end the career of any tor- 
pedo boat that came its way. Few types have ever justi- 
fied their name so successfully as the torpedo boat de- 
stroyer. So completely did it eliminate that little vessel 
as a danger to the fighting ships that practically all navies 
long since ceased to build torpedo boats. Yet the destroyer 
promptly succeeded to the chief function of the discarded 
vessel, that of attacking capital ships with torpedoes; and, in 
addition to this, it assumed the duty of protecting battleships 
from similar attack by enemy vessels of the same type. 

It surprises many people to learn that the destroyer is not 
a little boat but a warship of considerable size. This vessel 
to-day impresses most people as small only because all ships, 
those which are used for commerce and those which are used 
for war, have increased so greatly in displacement. The 
latest specimens of the destroyer carry four or five inch 
guns and twelve torpedo tubes, each of which launches a 
torpedo that weighs more than a ton, and runs as straight 
as an arrow for more than six miles. The Santa Maria, the 
largest vessel of the squadron with which Columbus made 
his first voyage to America, had a displacement of about five 
hundred tons, and thus was about half as large as a destroyer; 
and even at the beginning of the clipper ship era few vessels 
were much larger. 

Previous to 19 14 it was generally believed that torpedo 
attacks would play a large part in any great naval engage- 
ment, and this was the reason why all naval advisers insisted 
that a large number of these vessels should be constructed 
as essential units of the fleet. Yet the war had not made 
much progress when it became apparent that this versatile 
craft had another great part to play, and that it would once 



92 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

more justify its name in really heroic fashion. Just as 
it had proved its worth in driving the surface torpedo 
boat from the seas, so now it developed into a very dan- 
gerous foe to the torpedo boat that sailed beneath the 
waves. Events soon demonstrated that, in all open engage- 
ments between submarine and destroyer, the submarine 
stood very little chance. The reason for this was simply that 
the submarine had no weapon with which it could success- 
fully resist the attack of the destroyer, whereas the destroyer 
had several with which it could attack the submarine. The 
submarine had three or four torpedo tubes, and only one or 
two guns, and with neither could it afford to risk attacking 
the more powerfully armed destroyer. The U-boat was 
of such a fragile nature that it could never afford to engage 
in a combat in which it stood much chance of getting hit. 
A destroyer could stand a comparatively severe pounding 
and still remain fairly intact, but a single shell, striking a 
submarine, was a very serious matter; even though the vessel 
did not sink as a result, it was almost inevitable that certain 
parts of its machinery would be so injured that it would 
have difficulty in getting into port. It therefore became 
necessary for the submarine always to play safe, to fight only 
under conditions in which it had the enemy at such a dis- 
advantage that it ran little risk itself; and this was the rea- 
son why it preferred to attack merchant and passenger ships 
rather than vessels, such as the destroyer, that could en- 
ergetically defend themselves. 

The comparatively light draft of the destroyer, which is 
about nine or ten feet, pretty effectually protects it from the 
submarine's torpedo, for this torpedo, to function with its 
greatest efficiency, must take a course about fifteen feet 
under water; if it runs nearer the surface than this, it comes 
under the influence of the waves, and does not make a 
straight course. More important still, the speed of the 
destroyer, the ease with which it turns, circles, and zigzags, 
makes it all but impossible for a torpedo to be aimed with 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 93 

much chance of hitting her. Moreover, the discharge of this 
missile is a far more compHcated undertaking than is gen- 
erally supposed. The submarine commander cannot take 
position anywhere and discharge his weapon more or less 
wildly, running his chances of hitting; he must get his boat 
in place, calculate range, course, and speed, and take careful 
aim. Clearly it is difficult for him to do this successfully if 
his intended victim is scurrying along at the rate of thirty 
or forty miles an hour. Moreover, the destroyer is con- 
stantly changing its course, making great circles and indulg- 
ing in other disconcerting movements. So well did the 
Germans understand the difficulty of torpedoing a destroyer 
that they practically never attempted so unprofitable and so 
hazardous an enterprise. 

Torpedoes are complicated and expensive mechanisms; 
each one costs about $8,000 and the average U-boat carried 
only from eight to twelve; it was therefore necessary to 
husband these precious weapons, to use them only when the 
chances most favored success; the U-boat commander who 
wasted them in attempts to sink destroyers would probably 
have been court-martialed. 

But while the submarine had practically no means of 
successfully fighting the destroyer, the destroyer had several 
ways of putting an end to the submarine. The advantage 
which really made the destroyer so dangerous, as already 
intimated, was its excessive speed. On the surface the 
U-boat made little more than fifteen miles an hour, and 
under the surface it made little more than seven or eight. 
If the destroyer once discovered its presence, therefore, it 
could reach its prey in an incredibly short time. It could 
attack with its guns, and, if conditions were favorable, it 
could ram; and this was no trifling accident, for a destroyer 
going at thirty or forty miles could cut a submarine nearly 
in two with its strong, razor-like bow. In the early days of 
the war these were the main methods upon which it relied 
to attack, but by the time that I had reached London, an- 



94 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

other and much more frightful weapon had been devised. 
This was the depth charge, a large can containing about three 
hundred pounds of TNT, which, if it exploded anywhere 
within one hundred feet of the submarine, would either 
destroy it entirely or so injure it that the victim usually had 
to come to the surface and surrender. 

I once asked Admiral Jellicoe who was the real inventor of 
this annihilating missile. 

"No man in particular," he said. " It came into existence 
almost spontaneously, in response to a pressing need. Gun- 
fire can destroy submarines when they are on the surface, 
but you know it can accomplish nothing against them when 
they are submerged. This fact made it extremely diificult 
to sink them in the early days of the war. One day, when 
the Grand Fleet was cruising in the North Sea, a submarine 
fired a torpedo at one of the cruisers. The cruiser saw the 
periscope and the wake of the torpedo, and had little diffi- 
culty in so manoeuvring as to avoid being struck. She then 
went full speed to the spot from which the submarine had 
fired its torpedo, in the hope of ramming it. But by the 
time she arrived the submarine had submerged so deeply 
that the cruiser passed over her without doing her any harm. 
Yet the officers and crew could see the submerged hull; 
there the enemy lay in full view of her pursuers, yet perfectly 
safe! The officers reported this incident to me in the pres- 
ence of Admiral Madden, second in command. 

'"Wouldn't it have been fine,' said Madden, 'if they 
had had on board a mine so designed that, when dropped 
overboard, it would have exploded when it reached the 
depth at which the submarine was lying?' 

"That remark," continued Admiral Jellicoe, "gave us the 
germinal idea of the depth charge. I asked the Admiralty 
to get to work and produce a 'mine' that would act in the 
way that Admiral Madden had suggested. It proved to be 
very simple to construct — an ordinary steel cylinder filled 
with TNT; this was fitted with a simple firing appliance 



THE ADOPTION OFTHE CONVOY 95 

which was set off by the pressure of the water, and could be 
so adjusted that it would explode the charge at any depth 
desired. This apparatus was so simple and so necessary 
that we at once began to manufacture it." 

The depth charge looked like the innocent domestic ash 
can, and that was the name by which it soon came to 
be popularly known. Each destroyer eventually carried 
twenty or thirty of these destructive weapons at the stern; 
a mere pull on a lever would make one drop into the water. 
Many destroyers also carried strange-looking howitzers, 
which were made in the shape of a Y, and from which one 
ash can could be hurled fifty yards or more from each side 
of the vessel. The explosion, when it took place within the 
one hundred feet which I have mentioned as usually fatal 
to the submarine, would drive the plates inward and some- 
times make a leak so large that the vessel would sink almost 
instantaneously. At a somewhat greater distance it fre- 
quently produced a leak of such serious proportions that the 
submarine would be forced to blow her ballast tanks, come 
to the surface, and surrender. Even when the depth charge 
exploded considerably more than a hundred feet away, the 
result might be equally disastrous, for the concussion might 
distort the hull and damage the horizontal rudders, making 
it impossible to steer, or it might so injure the essential 
machinery that the submarine would be rendered helpless. 
Sometimes the lights went out, leaving the crew groping in 
blackness; necessary parts were shaken from their fasten- 
ings; and in such a case the commander had his choice of 
two alternatives, one to be crushed by the pressure of the 
water, and the other to come up and be captured or sunk 
by his surface foe. It is no reflection upon the courage of the 
submarine commanders to say that in this embarrassing 
situation they usually preferred to throw themselves upon 
the mercy of the enemy rather than to be smashed or to die 
a lingering and agonizing death under the water. Even 
when the explosion took place at a distance so great that the 



96 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

submarine was not seriously damaged, the experience was 
a highly disconcerting one for the crew. If a dozen depth 
charges were dropped, one after the other, the effect upon the 
men in the hunted vessel was particularly demoralizing. In 
the course of the war several of our own submarines were 
depth charged by our own destroyers, and from our crews 
we obtained graphic descriptions of the sensations which 
resulted. It was found that men who had passed through 
such an ordeal were practically useless for several days, and 
that sometimes they were rendered permanently unfit for 
service. The state of nerves which followed such an ex- 
perience was not unlike that new war psychosis known as 
shell shock. One of our officers who had had such an ad- 
venture told me that the explosion of a single depth charge 
under the water might be compared to the concussion pro- 
duced by the simultaneous firing of all the 14-inch guns of a 
battleship. One can only imagine what the concussion 
must have been when produced by ten or twenty depth 
charges in succession. Whether or not the submarine was 
destroyed or seriously injured, a depth-charged crew became 
extremely cautious in the future about getting anywhere 
in the neighborhood of a destroyer; and among the several 
influences which ultimately disorganized the morale of the 
German U-boat service these contacts with depth charges 
were doubtless the most important. The hardiest under- 
water sailor did not care to go through such frightful mo- 
ments a second time. 

This statement makes it appear as though the depth 
charge had settled the fate of the submarine. Yet that was 
far from being the case, for against the ash can, with its 
three hundred pounds of TNT, the submarine possessed 
one quality which gave it great defensive power. That was 
ability to make itself unseen. Strangely enough, the average 
layman is inclined to overlook this fairly apparent fact and 
that is the reason why, even at the risk of repeating myself, 
I frequently refer to it. Indeed, the only respect in which 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 97 

the subsurface boat differs essentially from all other war 
vessels is in this power of becoming invisible. Whenever it 
descries danger from afar, the submarine can disappear under 
the water in anywhere from twenty seconds to a minute. 
And its great advantage is that it can detect its enemy long 
before that enemy can detect the submarine. A U-boat, 
sailing awash, or sailing with only its conning tower exposed, 
can see a destroyer at a distance of about fifteen miles if the 
weather is clear; but, under similar conditions, the destroyer 
can see the submarine at a distance of about four miles. 
Possessing this great advantage the submarine can usually 
decide whether it will meet the enemy or not; if it decides 
that it is wise to avoid an encounter, all it has to do is to 
duck, remain submerged until the destroyer has passed on, 
entirely unconscious of its presence, and then to resume its 
real work, which is not that of fighting warships, but of sink- 
ing merchantmen. The chief anxiety of the U-boat com- 
mander is thus to avoid contact with its surface foe and its 
terrible depth charge, whereas the business of the destroyer 
commander is to get within fighting distance of his quarry. 

Ordinarily, conditions favor the U-boat in this game, 
simply because the ocean is so large a place. But there is 
one situation in which the destroyer has more than a fighing 
chance, for the power of the submarine to keep its presence 
secret lasts only so long as it remains out of action. If it 
makes no attempt to fight, its presence can hardly ever be 
detected; but just as soon as it becomes belligerent, it im- 
mediately reveals its whereabouts. If it comes to the sur- 
face and fires its guns, naturally it advertises to its enemy 
precisely where it is, but it betrays its location almost as 
clearly when it discharges a torpedo. Just as soon as the 
torpedo leaves the submarine, a wake, clearly marking its 
progress, appears upon the surface of the water. Though 
most newspaper readers have heard of this tell-tale track, 
I have found few who really understand what a conspicuous 
disturbance it is. The torpedo is really a little submarine 



98 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

itself; it is propelled by compressed air, the exhaust of which 
stirs up the water and produces a foamy, soapy wake, which 
is practically the same as that produced by the propeller of an 
ocean liner. This trail is four or five feet wide; it is as white 
and is as distinct as a chalk line drawn upon a blackboard, 
provided the weather is clear and the sun is in the right 
direction. Indeed, it is sometimes so distinct that an easily 
manoeuvred ship, and even sometimes a merchantman, can 
avoid the torpedo which it sees advancing merely by putting 
Over the helm and turning out of its course. But the chief 
value of this wake to the submarine hunters is that it shows 
the direction in which the submarine was located when the 
torpedo started on its course. It stands out on the surface 
of the water like a long, ghostly fmger pointing to the spot 
where the foe let loose its shaft. 

As soon as the destroyer sees this betraying disturbance, 
the commander rings for full speed; and one of the greatest 
advantages of this type of vessel is that it can attain full 
speed in an incredibly short time. The destroyer then dashes 
down the wake until it reaches the end, which indicates the 
point where the submarine lay when it discharged its missile. 
At this point the surface vessel drops a depth charge and 
then begins cutting a circle, say, to the right. Pains are 
taken to make this circle so wide that it will include the 
submarine, provided it has gone in that direction. The 
destroyer then makes another circle to the left. Every 
ten or fifteen seconds, while describing these circles, it drops 
a depth charge; indeed, not infrequently it drops twenty or 
thirty in a few minutes. If there is another destroyer in the 
neighborhood it also follows up the wake and when it 
reaches the indicated point, it circles in the opposite direction 
from the first. Sometimes more than two may start for the 
suspected location and, under certain conditions, the water 
within a radius of half a mile or more may be seething with 
exploding depth charges. 

It is plain from this description that the proceeding 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 99 

develops into an exceedingly dangerous game for the at- 
tacking submarine. It is a simple matter to calculate the 
,;hances of escaping which the enemy has under these 
conditions. That opportunity is clearly measured by 
the time which elapses from the moment when it dis- 
charges its torpedo to the moment when the destroyer has 
reached the point at which it was discharged. This interval 
gives the subsurface boat a certain chance to get away; 
but its under-water speed is moderate, and so by the time 
the destroyer reaches the critical spot, the submarine has 
advanced but a short distance away from it. How far has 
she gone? In what direction did she go? These are the 
two questions which the destroyer commander must answer, 
and the success with which he answers them accurately 
measures his success in sinking or damaging his enemy, or 
in giving him a good scare. If he always decided these two 
points accurately, he would almost always "get" his sub- 
marine; the chances of error are very great, however, and 
that is the reason why the submarine in most cases gets away. 
All that the surface commander knows is that there is a 
U-boat somewhere in his neighborhood, but he does not 
know its precise location and so he is fighting more or less 
in the dark. In the great majority of cases the submarine 
does get away, but now and then the depth charge reaches 
its goal and ends its career. 

If only one destroyer is hunting, the chances of escape 
strongly favor the under-water craft; if several pounce upon 
her at once, however, the chances of escaping are much more 
precarious. If the water is shallow the U-boat can some- 
times outwit the pursuer by sinking to the bottom and lying 
there in silent security until its surface enemy tires of the 
chase. But in the open sea there is no possibility of con- 
cealing itself and so saving itself in this fashion, for if the 
submarine sinks beyond a certain depth the pressure of the 
water will crush it. 

While the record shows that the U-boat usually succeeded 



100 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

in evading the depth charges there were enough sunk or 
seriously damaged or given a bad shakeup to serve as a 
constant reminder to the crews that they ran great danger 
in approaching waters which were protected by destroyers. 
The U-boat captains, as will appear, avoided such waters 
regularly; they much preferred to attack their merchant 
prey in areas where these soul-racking depth charges did not 
interfere with their operations. 

It is now becoming apparent why the great battle fleet, 
which always sailed behind a protecting screen of such de- 
stroyers, was practically immune from torpedo attack. In 
order to assail these battleships the submarine was always 
compelled to do the one thing which, above all others, it was 
determined to avoid — to get within depth-charge radius of 
the surface craft. In discharging the torpedo, distance, as 
already intimated, is the all-important consideration. The 
U-boat carries a torpedo which has a much shorter range than 
that of the destroyer; it was seldom eifective if fired at more 
than 2,000 yards, and beyond that distance its chances of 
hitting became very slight. Indeed, a much shorter distance 
than that was desirable if the torpedo was to accomplish its 
most destructive purpose. So valuable were these missiles 
and so necessary was it that every one should be used to 
good advantage, that the U-boat's captain had instructions 
to shoot at no greater distance than three hundred yards, 
unless the conditions were particularly favorable. In the 
early days, the torpedoes which were fired at a greater dis- 
tance would often hit the ships on the bow or the stern, and 
do comparatively little damage; such vessels could be 
brought in, repaired in a short time, and again put to sea. 
The German Admiralty discovered that in firing from a 
comparatively long distance it was wasting its torpedoes; 
it therefore ordered its men to get so near the prey that it 
could strike the vessel in a vital spot, preferably in the engine 
room; and to do this it was necessary to creep up within 300 
yards. But to get as close as that to the destroyers which 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY loi 

screened the battleships meant almost certain destruction. 
Thus the one method of attack which was left to the U-boat 
was to dive under the destroyer screen and come up in the 
midst of the battle fleet itself. A few minutes after its pres- 
ence should become known, however, a large number of 
destroyers would be dropping depth charges in its neigh- 
borhood, and its chances of escaping destruction would 
be almost nil, to say nothing of its chances of destroying 
ships. 

The Germans learned the futility of this kind of an opera- 
tion early in the war, and the man who taught them this 
lesson was Commander Weddingen, the same officer who had 
first demonstrated the value of the submarine in practical 
warfare. It was Otto Weddingen who, in September, 19 14, 
sank the old British cruisers, the Hogue, the Cressy, and the 
Ahoukir, an exploit which made him one of the great popular 
heroes of Germany. A few months afterward Commander 
Weddingen decided to try an experiment which was con- 
siderably more hazardous than that of sinking three un- 
escorted cruisers; he aspired to nothing less ambitious than 
an attack upon the Grand Fleet itself. On March i8th 
a part of this fleet was cruising off Cromarty, Scotland; here 
Weddingen came with the U-2g, dove under the destroyer 
screen and fired one torpedo, which passed astern of the 
Neptune. The alarm was immediately sounded and pres- 
ently the battleship Dreadnought, which had seen the peri- 
scope, started at full speed for the submarine, rammed the 
vessel and sent it promptly to the bottom. As it was sinking 
the bow rose out of the water, plainly disclosing the number 
U-29. There was not one survivor. Weddingen's attempt 
was an heroic one, but so disastrous to himself and to his 
vessel that very few German commanders ever tried 
to emulate his example. It clearly proved to the German 
Admiralty that it was useless to attempt to destroy the 
Grand Fleet with submarines, or even to weaken it piece- 
meal, and probably this experience had much to do with 



102 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

this new kind of warfare — that of submarines against un- 
protected merchant ships — which the Germans now pro- 
ceeded to introduce. 

The simple fact is that the battle fleet was never so safe 
as when it was cruising in the open sea, screened by de- 
stroyers. It was far safer when it was sailing thus defiantly, 
constantly inviting attack, than when it was anchored at 
its unprotected base at Scapa Flow. Indeed, until Scapa 
Flow was impregnably protected by booms and mines, the 
British commanders recognized that cruising in the open 
sea was its best means of avoiding the German U-boats. 
No claim is made that the submarine cannot dive un- 
der the destroyer screen and attack a battle fleet, and 
possibly torpedo one or more of its vessels. The illustra- 
tion which has been given shows that Weddingen nearly 
"got" the Neptune; and had this torpedo gone a few feet 
nearer, his experiment might have shown that, although he 
subsequently lost his own life, crew, and ship he had sunk one 
British battleship, a proceeding which, in war, might have 
been recognized as a fair exchange. But the point which I wish 
to emphasize is that the chances of success were so small 
that the Germans decided that it was not worth while to 
make the attempt. Afterward, when merchant vessels 
were formed into convoys, a submarine would occasionally 
dive under the screen and destroy a ship; but most such at- 
tacks were unsuccessful, and experience taught the Ger- 
mans that a persistent effort of this kind would cause the 
destruction of so many submarines that their campaign would 
fail. So the U-boat commanders left the Grand Fleet alone, 
either because they lacked nerve, or because their instruc- 
tions from Berlin were explicit to that effect. 

II 

HAVING constantly before my eyes this picture of the 
Grand Fleet immune from torpedo attack, naturally 
the first question I asked, when discussing the situation with 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 103 

Admiral Jellicoe and others, was this: "Why not apply 
this same principle to merchant ships?" 

If destroyers could keep the submarines away from bat- 
tleships, they could certainly keep them away from mer- 
chantmen. It is clear, from the description already given, 
precisely how the battleships had been made safe from sub- 
marines; they had proceeded, as usual, in a close formation, 
or "convoy," and their destroyer screen had proved effective. 
Thus logic apparently indicated that the convoy system 
was the "answer" to the submarine. 

Yet the convoy, as used in previous wars, differed ma- 
terially from any application of the idea which could possibly 
be made to the present contest. This scheme of sailing 
vessels in groups, and escorting them by warships, is almost 
as old as naval warfare itself. As early as the Thirteenth 
Century, the merchants of the Hanseatic League were com- 
pelled to sail their ships in convoy as a protection against 
the pirates who were then constantly lurking in the Baltic 
Sea. The government of Venice used this same device 
to protect its enormous commerce. In the Fifteenth Cen- 
tury the large trade in wool and wine which existed between 
England and the Moorish ports of Spain was safeguarded 
by convoys, and in the Sixteenth Century Spain herself 
regularly depended upon massing her ships to defend her com- 
merce with the West Indies against the piratical attacks of 
English and French adventurers. The escorts provided 
for these "flotas" really laid the foundation of the mighty 
Spanish fleet which threatened England's existence for more 
than a hundred years. By the time of Queen Elizabeth the 
convoy had thus become the all-prevailing method of safe- 
guarding merchant shipping, but it was in the Napoleonic 
wars that it had reached its greatest usefulness. The con- 
voys of that period were managed with some military preci- 
sion; there were carefully stipulated methods of collecting 
the ships, of meeting the cruiser escorts at the appointed 
rendezvous, and of dispersing them when the danger zone 



104 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

was passed; and naval officers were systematically put in 
charge. The convoys of this period were very large; from 
200 to 300 ships were not an unusual gathering, and some- 
times 500 or more would get together at certain important 
places, such as the entrance to the Baltic. But these ships, 
of course, were very small compared with those of the 
present time. It was only necessary to supply such aggrega- 
tions of vessels with enough protecting cruisers to over- 
whelm any raiders which the enemy might send against 
them. The merchantmen were not required to sail in any 
particular formation, nor were they required to manoeuvre 
against unseen mysterious foes. Neither was it absolutely 
essential that they should keep constantly together; and 
they could even spread themselves somewhat loosely over 
the ocean. If an enemy raider appeared on the horizon, the 
escorting cruiser or cruisers left the convoy and began chase; 
a battle ensued, the convoy meanwhile passing on its voyage 
unharmed. When its protecting vessels had disposed of the 
attackers, they rejoined the merchantmen. No unusual 
seamanship was demanded of the merchant captains, for the 
whole responsibility for their safety rested with the escorting 
cruisers. 

But the operation of beating ofiF an occasional surface 
raider, which necessarily fights in the open, is quite a dif- 
ferent procedure from that of protecting an aggregation of 
vessels from enemies that discharge torpedoes under the 
water. As part protection against such insidious attacks 
both the merchant ships and the escorting men-of-war of to- 
day had in this war to keep up a perpetual zigzagging. This 
zigzag, indeed, was in itself an efficacious method of protec- 
tion. As already said, the submarine was forced to attain an 
advantageous position before it could discharge its torpedo; 
it was its favorite practice to approach to within a few 
hundred yards in order to hit its victim in a vital spot. This 
mere fact shov/s that zigzagging in itself was one of the best 
methods of avoiding destruction. Before this became the 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 105 

general rule, the task of torpedoing a vessel was compara- 
tively easy. All it was necessary for the submarine to do 
was to bring the vessel's masts in line; that is, to get directly 
ahead of her, submerge with the small periscope showing 
only occasionally, and to fire the torpedo at short range as 
the ship passed by. Except in the case of very slow vessels, 
she could of course do this only when she was not far from 
the course of her advancing prey when she first sighted her. 
If, however, the vessel was zigzagging, this pretty game was 
usually defeated; the submarine never knew in what direction 
to go in order to get within torpedoing distance, and she 
could not go far because her speed under water is so slow. 
The same conditions apply to a zigzagging convoy. This 
explained why, as soon as the merchant vessel or convoy 
entered the submarine zone, or as soon as a submarine was 
sighted, it began zigzagging, first on one side and then on the 
other, and always irregularly, its course comprising a dis- 
jointed line, which made it a mere chance whether the sub- 
marine could get into a position from which to fire with any 
certainty of obtaining results. A vessel sailing alone could 
manoeuvre in this way without much difficulty, but it is ap- 
parent that twenty or thirty vessels, sailing in close forma- 
tion, would not find the operation a simple one. It was 
necessary for them to sail in close and regular formation in 
order to make it possible to manoeuvre them and screen them 
with destroyers, so it is evident that the closer the formation 
the fewer the destroyers that would be needed to protect 
it. These circumstances make the modern convoy quite a 
different affair from the happy-go-lucky proceeding of the 
Napoleonic Era. 

It is perhaps not surprising that the greatest hostility to 
the convoys has always come from the merchant captains 
themselves. In old days they chafed at the time which was 
consumed in assembling the ships, at the necessity for re- 
ducing speed to enable the slower vessels to keep up with the 
procession, and at the delay in getting their cargoes into port. 



ib6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

In all wars in which convoys have been used it has been very 
difficult to keep the merchant captains in line. In Nelson's 
day these fine old salts were constantly breaking away from 
their convoys and taking their chances of running into port 
unescorted. If the merchant master of a century ago re- 
belled at the comparatively simply managed convoy of those 
days it is not strange that their successors of the present time 
should not have looked with favor upon the relatively com- 
plicated and difficult arrangement required of them in this 
war. In the early discussions with these men at the Ad- 
miralty they showed themselves almost unanimously opposed 
to the convoy. 

"The merchantmen themselves are the chief obstacle to 
the convoy," said Admiral Jellicoe. "We have discussed it 
with them many times and they declare that it is impossible. 
It is all right for war vessels to manoeuvre in close formation, 
they say, for we spend our time practising in these forma- 
tions, and so they think that it is second nature to us. But 
they say that they cannot do it. They particularly reject 
the idea that when in formation they can manoeuvre their 
ships in the fog or at night without lights. They believe 
that they would lose more ships through collisions than the 
submarines would sink." 

I was told that the whole subject had been completely 
threshed out at a meeting which had been held at the Ad- 
miralty on February 23, 191 7, about six weeks before Am- 
erica had entered the war. At that time ten masters of mer- 
chant ships had met Admiral Jellicoe and other members 
of the Admiralty and had discussed the convoy proposition 
at length. In laying the matter before these experienced 
seamen Admiral Jellicoe emphasized the necessity of good 
station-keeping, and he described the close formation which 
the vessels would have to maintain. It would be necessary 
for the ships to keep together, he explained, otherwise the 
submarines could pick off the stragglers. He asked the 
masters whether eight merchant ships, which had a speed 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 107 

varying perhaps two knots, could keep station in line ahead 
(that is, in single file or column) 500 yards apart, and sail 
in two columns down the Channel. 

"It would be absolutely impossible," the ten masters 
replied, almost in a chorus. 

A discouraging fact, they said, was that many of the ablest 
merchant captains had gone into the navy, and that many 
of those who had replaced them could not be depended on 
to handle their ships in such a formation. 

"We have so few competent deck officers that the captain 
would have to be on the bridge the whole tv/enty-four 
hours," they said. And the difficulty was not only with the 
bridge, but with the engine-room. In order to keep the 
ships constantly the same distance apart it would be neces- 
sary accurately to regulate their speed; the battleships could 
do this because they had certain elaborate devices, which the 
merchant vessels lacked, for timing the revolutions of the 
engines. The poor quality of the coal which they were ob- 
taining would also make it difficult to maintain a regular 
speed. 

Admiral Jellicoe then asked the masters whether they 
could sail in twos or threes and keep station. 

"Two might do it, but three would be too many," was the 
discouraging verdict. But the masters were positive that 
even two merchantmen could not safely keep station abreast 
in the night time without lights; two such vessels would 
have to sail in single file, the leading ship showing a stern 
light. The masters emphasized their conviction that they 
preferred to sail alone, each ship for herself, and to let each 
one take her chances of getting into port. 

And there the matter rested. I had the opportunity of 
discussing the convoy system with several merchant captains, 
and in these discussions they simply echoed the views which 
had been expressed at this formal conference. 1 do not be- 
lieve that British naval officers came in contact with a single 
merchant master who favored the convoy at that time. 



io8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

They were not doubtful about the idea; they were openly 
hostile. The British merchant captains are a magnificent 
body of seamen; their first thought was to serve their country 
and the Allied cause; their attitude in this matter was not 
obstinacy; it simply resulted from their sincere conviction 
that the convoy system would entail greater shipping 
losses than were then being inflicted by the German sub- 
marines. 

Many naval officers at that time shared this same view. 
They opposed the convoy not only on these grounds; its 
introduction would mean immediately cutting down the 
tonnage 15 or 20 per cent., because of the time which would 
be consumed in assembling the ships and awaiting escorts 
and in the slower average speed which they could make. 
Many ship owners and directors of steamship companies 
expressed the same opinions. They also objected to the 
convoy on the ground that it would cause considerable delay 
and hence would result in loss of earnings. Yet the attitude 
of the merchant marine had not entirely eliminated the con- 
voy from consideration. At the time when I arrived the 
proposal was still being discussed; the rate at which the 
Germans were sinking merchantmen made this inevitable. 
And there seemed to be two schools among Allied naval 
men, one of which was opposed to the convoy, while the 
other insisted that it should be given a trial. The convoy 
had one irresistible attraction for the officer which seemed to 
counterbalance all the objections which were being urged 
against it. Its adoption would mean taking the offensive 
against the German submarines. The essential defect of 
the patrol system, as it was then conducted, was that it was 
primarily a defensive measure. Each destroyer cruised 
around in an assigned area, ready to assist vessels in distress, 
escort ships through her own "square" and, incidentally, 
to attack a submarine when the opportunity was presented. 
But the mere fact that a destroyer was patrolling a particular 
area, meant only, as already explained, that the submarine 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 109 

had occasionally to sink out of sight until she had passed by. 
Consequently the submarine proceeded to operate whenever 
a destroyer was not in sight, and this was necessarily most 
of the time, for the submarine zone was such a big place and 
the Allied destroyer fleet was so pitifully small that it was 
impossible to cover it effectively. Under these conditions 
there were very few encounters between destroyers and sub- 
marines, at least in the waters south and west of Ireland, for 
the submarines took all precautions against getting close 
enough to be sighted by the destroyers. 

But the British and French navies were not the only ones 
which, at this time, were depending upon the patrol as a 
protection against the subsurface boat. The American 
navy was committing precisely the same error off our At- 
lantic coast. As soon as Congress declared war against 
Germany we expected that at least a few of the U-boats 
would cross the Atlantic and attack American shipping; 
indeed, many believed that some had already crossed in 
anticipation of war; the papers were filled with silly stories 
about "submarine bases" in Mexican waters, on the New 
England coast, and elsewhere; submarines were even re- 
ported entering Long Island Sound; nets were stretched 
across the Narrows to keep them out of New York Harbor; 
and our coasting vessels saw periscopes and the wakes of 
torpedoes everywhere from Maine to Florida. So prevalent 
was this apprehension that, in the early days of the war, 
American destroyers regularly patrolled our coast looking 
for these far-flung submarines. Yet the idea of seeking 
them this way was absurd. Even had we known where the 
submarine was located there would have been little likeli- 
hood that we could ever have sighted it, to say nothing of 
getting near it. We might have learned that a German U- 
boat was operating off Cape Cod; we might have had the 
exact latitude and longitude of the location which it was 
expected that it would reach at a particular moment. At 
the time the message was sent the submarine might have 



no THE VICTORY AT SEA 

been lying on the surface ready to attack a passing mer- 
chantman, but even under these conditions the destroyer 
could never have reached her quarry, for as soon as the 
U-boat saw the enemy approaching it would simply have 
ducked under the water and remained there in perfect safety 
When all danger had passed it would again have bobbed up 
to the surface as serenely as you please, and gone ahead 
with its appointed task of sinking merchant ships. One 
of the astonishing things about this war was that many of 
the naval officers of all countries did not seem to understand 
until a very late date that it was utterly futile to send anti- 
submarine surface craft out into the wide ocean to attack or 
chase away submarines. The thing to do, of course, was to 
make the submarines come to the anti-submarine craft and 
fight in order to get merchantmen. 

I have made this point before, and I now repeat the ex- 
planation to emphasize that the patrol system was necessar- 
ily unsuccessful, because it made almost impossible any com- 
bats with submarines and afforded very little protection 
to shipping. The advantage of the convoy system, as 
its advocates now urged, was precisely that it made such 
combats inevitable. In other words, it meant offensive 
warfare. It was proposed to surround each convoy with a 
protecting screen of destroyers in precisely the same way 
that the battle fleet was protected. Thus we should compel 
any submarine which was planning to torpedo a convoyed 
ship to do so only in waters that were infested with de- 
stroyers. In order to get into position to discharge its 
missile the submarine would have to creep up close to the 
rim that marked the circle of these destroyers. Just as 
soon as the torpedo started on its course and the tell-tale 
wake appeared on the surface the protecting ships would 
immediately begin sowingthe waters with their depth charges. 
Thus in the future the Germans would be compelled to fight 
for every ship which they should attempt to sink, instead 
of sinking them conveniently in waters that were free of 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY iii 

destroyers, as had hitherto been their privilege. Already 
the British had demonstrated that such a screen of destroyers 
could protect merchant ships as well as war vessels. They 
were making this fact clear every day in the successful 
transportation of troops and supplies across the Channel. 
In this region they had established an immune zone, which 
was constantly patrolled by destroyers and other anti- 
submarine craft and through these the merchant fleets were 
constantly passing with complete safety. The proposal 
to convoy all merchant ships was a proposal to apply this 
same system on a much broader scale. If we should arrange 
our ships in compact convoys and protect them with de- 
stroyers we would really create another immune zone of this 
kind and this would be different from the one established 
across the Channel only in that it would be a movable one. 
In this way we should establish about a square mile of the 
surface of the ocean in which submarines could not operate 
without great danger, and then we could move that square 
mile along until port was reached. 

The advantages of the convoy were thus so apparent that, 
despite the pessimistic attitude of the merchant captains, 
there were a number of officers in the British navy who kept 
insisting that it should be tried. In this discussion I took 
my stand emphatically with these officers. From the be- 
ginning I had believed in this method of combating the 
U-boat warfare. Certain early experiences had led me to 
believe that the merchant captains were wrong in under- 
estimating the quality of their own seamanship. It was my 
conviction that these intelligent and hardy men did not 
really know how capable they were at handling ships. In 
my discussions with them they disclosed an exaggerated 
idea of the seamanly ability of naval officers in manoeuvring 
their large fleets. They attributed this to the superior 
training of the men and to the special manceuvring qualities 
of the ship. "Warships are built so that they can keep sta- 
tion, and turn at any angle at a moment's notice," they would 



112 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

say, "but we haven't any men on our ship who can do these 
things." As a matter of fact, these men were entirely in 
error and I knew it. Their practical experience in handling 
ships of all sizes, shapes, and speeds under a great variety 
of conditions is in reality much more extensive than naval 
officers can possibly enjoy. I learned this more than thirty 
years ago, when stationed on the Pennsylvania schoolship, 
teaching the boys navigation. This was one of the most 
valuable experiences of my life, for it brought me in 
every-day contact with merchant seamen, and it was then 
that 1 made the discovery which proved so valuable to me 
now. 

It is true that merchant captains had much to learn about 
steaming and manoeuvring in formation, but I was sure they 
could pick it up quickly and carry it out successfully under 
the direction of naval officers — the convoy commander being 
always a naval officer. 

The naval officer not only has a group of vessels that are 
practically uniform in speed and ability to turn around 
quickly, but he is provided also with various instruments 
which enable him to keep the revolutions of his engines con- 
stant, to measure distances and the like. Moreover, as a 
junior officer, he is schooled in manoeuvring these very ships 
for some years before he is trusted with the command of one 
of them, and he, therefore, not only knows their peculiarities, 
but also those of their captains — the latter very useful infor- 
mation, by the way. 

Though it was necessary for the merchantmen, on the other 
hand, to bring their much clumsier ships into formation with 
perhaps thirty entirely strange vessels of different sizes, 
shapes, speeds, nationalities, and manoeuvring qualities, yet 
I was confident that they were competent to handle them 
successfully under these difficult conditions. Indeed, after- 
ward, one of my most experienced destroyer commanders 
reported that while he was escorting a convoy of twenty- 
eight ships they kept their stations quite as well as battle- 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 113 

ships, while they were executing two manoeuvres to avoid 
a submarine. 

Such influence as I possessed at this time, therefore, I 
threw with the group of British officers which was advocating 
the convoy. 

There was, however, still one really serious impediment to 
adopting this convoy system and that was that the number 
of destroyers available was insufficient. The British, for 
reasons which have been explained, did not have the neces- 
sary destroyers for this work and this was what made so 
very important the participation of the United States in the 
naval war — for our navy possessed the additional vessels 
that would make possible the immediate adoption of the 
convoy system. I do not wish to say that the convoy 
would not have been established had we not sent destroy- 
ers for that purpose, yet 1 do not see how otherwise it could 
have been established in any complete and systematic way 
at such an early date. And we furnished other ships than 
destroyers, for besides providing what I have called the 
modern convoy — that which protects the compact mass of 
vessels from submarines — it was necessary also to furnish 
escorts after the old Napoleonic plan. It was the business 
of the destroyers to conduct the merchantmen only through 
the submarine zone. They did not take them the whole 
distance across the ocean, for there was little danger of 
submarine attack until the ships had arrived in the infested 
waters. This would have been impossible in any case with 
the limited number of destroyers. But from the time the 
convoys left the home port there was a possibility that the 
same kind of attack would be launched as that to which con- 
voys were subjected in Nelsonian days; there was the danger, 
that is, that surface war vessels, raiders or cruisers, might 
escape from their German bases and swoop down upon 
them. We always had before our minds the activities of 
the Moewe, and we therefore deemed it necessary to escort the 
convoys across the ocean with battleships and cruisers, just 



114 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

as was the practice a century ago. The British did not have 
ships enough available for this purpose, and here again the 
American navy was able to supply the lack; for we had a 
number of pre-dreadnaughts and cruisers that were ideally 
adapted to this kind of work. 

HI 

ON APRIL 30th I received a message from Admiral J ellicoe 
requesting me to visit him at the Admiralty. When I 
arrived he said that the projected study of the convoy system 
had been made and he handed me a copy of it. It had been 
decided to send one experimental convoy from Gibraltar. 
The Admiralty, he added, had not yet definitely decided 
that the convoy system should be adopted, but there was 
every intention of giving it a thorough and fair trial. That 
same evening at dinner I met Mr. Lloyd George, Sir Edward 
Carson, and Lord Milner and once more discussed with them 
the whole convoy idea. I found the Prime Minister espe- 
cially favorable to the plan and, in fact, civilians in general 
were more kindly disposed toward the convoy than sea^ 
men, because they were less familiar with the nautical and 
shipping difficulties which it involved. 

Naval officers were immediately sent to Gibraltar to in- 
struct the merchant masters in the details of assembling and 
conducting vessels. Eight-knot ships were selected for the 
experiment, and a number of destroyers were assigned for 
their protection. The merchant captains, as was to be ex- 
pected, regarded the whole enterprise suspiciously, but en- 
tered into it with the proper spirit. 

On May 20th that first convoy arrived at its English 
destination in perfect condition. The success with which it 
made the voyage disproved all the pessimistic opinions 
which the merchant sailors had entertained about them- 
selves. They suddenly discovered, as 1 had contended, that 
they could do practically everything which, in their con- 
ferences with the Admiralty, they had declared that they 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 115 

were unable to do. In those meetings they had asserted 
that not more than two ships could keep station; but now 
they discovered that the whole convoy could sail with stipu- 
lated distances between the vessels and keep this format 
tion with little difficulty. They were drilled on the way in 
zigzagging and manoeuvring — a practice carried out sub- 
sequently with all convoys — and by the time they reached 
the danger zone they found that, in obedience to a pre- 
arranged signal, all the ships could turn as a single one, and 
perform all the zigzag evolutions which the situation de- 
manded. They had asserted that they could not sail at night 
without lights and that an attempt to do so would result in 
many collisions, but the experimental convoy proved that 
this was merely another case of self-delusion. Naturally the 
arrival of this convoy caused the greatest satisfaction in 
the Admiralty, but the most delighted men were the mer- 
chant captains themselves, for the whole thing was to them 
a complete revelation of their seamanly ability and naturally^ 
it flattered their pride. The news of this arrival naturally 
travelled fast in shipping circles; it completely changed the 
attitude of the merchant sailors, and the chief opponents of 
the convoy now became its most enthusiastic advocates. 

Outside of shipping circles, however, nothing about this 
convoy was known at that time. Yet May 20th, the date 
when it reached England safely, marked one of the great 
turning points of the war. That critical voyage meant noth- 
ing less than that the Allies had found the way of defeating 
the German submarine. The world might still clamor for a 
specific "invention" that would destroy all the submarines 
overnight, or it might demand that the Allies should block 
them in their bases, or suggest that they might do any num- 
ber of impossible things, but the naval chiefs of the Allies 
discovered, on May 20, 191 7, that they could defeat the 
German campaign even without these rather uncertain aids. 
The submarine danger was by no means ended when this 
first convoy arrived ; many anxious months still lay ahead of 



ii6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

us; other means would have to be devised that would supple- 
ment the convoy; yet the all-important fact was that the 
Allied chiefs now realized, for the first time, that the problem 
was not an insoluble one; and that, with hard work and in- 
finite patience, they could keep open the communications 
that were essential to victory. The arrival of these weather- 
beaten ships thus brought the assurance that the armies and 
the civilian populations could be supplied with food and 
materials, and that the seas could be kept open for the trans- 
portation of American troops to France. In fine, it meant 
that the Allies could win the war. 

On May 21st the British Admiralty, which this experi- 
mental convoy had entirely converted, voted to adopt the 
convoy system for all merchant shipping. Not long after- 
ward the second convoy arrived safely from Hampton Roads 
and then other convoys began to put in from Scandinavian 
ports. On July 21 st I was able definitely to report to Wash- 
ington that "the success of the convoys so far brought in 
shows that the system will defeat the submarine campaign 
if applied generally and in time." 

But while we recognize the fact that the convoy pre- 
served our communications and so made possible the con- 
tinuation of the war, we must not overlook a vitally im- 
portant element in its success. In describing the work of 
the destroyer, which was the protecting arm of the convoy, I 
have said nothing about the forces that really laid the whole 
foundation of the anti-submarine campaign. All the time 
that these destroyers were fighting off the submarines the 
power that made possible their operations was cruising 
quietly in the North Sea, doing its work so inconspicuously 
that the world was hardly aware of its existence. For back 
of all these operations lay the mighty force of the Grand 
Fleet. Admiral Beatty's dreadnaughts and battle cruisers, 
which were afterward supplemented by a fine squadron of 
American ships, kept the German surface vessels penned in 
their harbors and in this way left the ocean free for the 



THE ADOPTION OF THE CONVOY 117 

operations of the Allied surface craft. I have already said 
that, in April, 191 7, the Allied navies, while they controlled 
the surface of the water, did not control the subsurface, which 
at that time was practically at the disposition of the Ger- 
mans. Yet the determining fact, as we were now to learn, 
was that this control of the surface was to give us the control 
of the subsurface also. Only the fact that the battleships 
kept the German fleet at bay made it possible for the de- 
stroyers and other surface craft to do their beneficent work. 
In an open sea battle their surface navies would have dis- 
posed of the German fleet, but let us suppose for a moment 
that an earthquake, or some other great natural disturbance, 
had engulfed the British fleet at Scapa Flow. The world 
would then have been at Germany's mercy and all the de- 
stroyers the Allies could have put upon the sea would have 
availed them nothing, for the German battleships and battle 
cruisers could have sunk them or driven them into their 
ports. Then Allied commerce would have been the prey, 
not only of the submarines, which could have operated with 
the utmost freedom, but of the German surface craft as well. 
In a few weeks the British food supplies would have been 
exhausted. There would have been an early end to the 
soldiers and munitions which Britain was constantly sending 
to France. The United States could have sent no forces 
to the Western Front and the result would have been the 
surrender which the Allies themselves, in the spring of 191 7, 
regarded as not a remote possibility. America would then 
have been compelled to face the German power alone, and to 
face it long before we had had an opportunity of assem- 
bling our resources and of equipping our armies. The world 
was preserved from all these calamities because the destroyer 
and the convoy solved the problem of the submarine and 
because back of these agencies of victory lay Admiral Beat- 
ty's squadrons, holding at arm's length the German surface 
ships while these comparatively fragile craft were saving 
the liberties of the world. 




CHAPTER IV 
AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 

I 

UR first division of destroyers reached Queens- 
town on a Friday morning, May 4, 191 7; the fol- 
lowing Monday they put to sea on the business 
of hunting the submarine and protecting com- 
merce. For the first month or six weeks they spent practi- 
cally all their time on patrol duty in company with British 
destroyers, sloops, and other patrol vessels. Though the 
convoy system was formally adopted in the latter part of 
May, it was not operating completely and smoothly until 
August or September. Many troop and merchant convoys 
were formed in the intervening period and many were con- 
ducted through the submarine zone by American destroyers; 
but our ships spent much time sailing singly, hunting for 
such enemies as might betray their presence, or escorting in- 
dividual cargoes. The early experiments had demonstrated 
the usefulness of the convoy system, yet a certain number of 
pessimists still refused to accept it as the best solution of the 
shipping problem ; and to reorganize practically all the ship- 
ping of the world, scattered everywhere on the seven seas, 
necessarily took time. 

But this intervening period furnished indispensable train- 
ing for our men. They gained an every-day familiarity 
with the waters which were to form the scene of their opera- 
tions and learned many of the tricks of the German sub- 
marines. It was a strange world in which these young 
Americans now found themselves. The life was a hard one, 
of course, in those tempestuous Irish waters, with the little 

118 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 119 

destroyers jumping from wave to wave, sometimes showing 
daylight beneath their keels, their bows frequently pointing 
skyward, or plunged deep into heavy seas, and their sides 
occasionally plowing along under the foamy waves. For 
days the men lived in a world of fog and mist ; rain in those 
regions seemed to be almost the normal state of nature. 
Much has been written about the hardships of life aboard 
the destroyer, and to these narratives our men could add 
many details of their own. These hardships, however, did 
not weigh heavily upon them, for existence in those waters, 
though generally monotonous, possessed at times plenty of 
interest and excitement. The very appearance of the sea 
showed that our men were engaging in a kind of warfare 
very different from that for which they had been trained. 
The enormous amount of shipping seemed to give the lie to 
the German reports that British commerce had been practi- 
cally arrested. A perpetual stream of all kinds of vessels, 
liners, tramps, schooners, and fishing boats, was passing 
toward the Irish and the English coasts. Yet here and there 
other floating objects on the surface told the story. Now it 
was a stray boat filled with the survivors of a torpedoed 
vessel ; now a raft on which lay the bodies of dead men ; now 
the derelict hulk of a ship which the Germans had abandoned 
as sunk, but which persisted in floating aimlessly around, 
a constant danger to navigation. Loose mines, bobbing 
in the water, hinted at the perils that were constantly threat- 
ening our forces. In the tense imagination of the lookouts 
floating spars or other debris easily took the form of peri- 
scopes. Queer-looking sailing vessels, at a distance, aroused 
suspicions that they might be submarines in disguise. A 
phosphorescent trail in the water was sometimes mistaken 
for the wake of a torpedo. The cover of a hatchway floating 
on the surface, if seen at a distance of a few hundred yards, 
looked much like the conning-tower of a submarine, while 
the back of an occasional whale gave a lifelike representa- 
tion of a U-boat awash — in fact, so lifelike was it that on one 



I20 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

occasion several of our submarine chasers on the English 
coast dropped depth charges on a whale and killed it. 

But it was the invisible rather than the visible evidences 
of warfare that especially impressed our men. The air all 
around them was electric with life and information. One 
had only to put the receiver of the wireless to his ear to fmd 
himself in a new and animated world. The atmosphere was 
constantly spluttering messages of all kinds coming from all 
kinds of places. Sometimes these were sent by Admiral 
Bayly from Queenstown ; they would direct our men to go to 
an indicated spot and escort an especially valuable cargo 
ship; they would tell a particular commander that a subma- 
rine was lying at a designated latitude and longitude and in- 
struct him to go and "get" it. Running conversations 
were frequently necessary between destroyers and the ships 
which they had been detailed to escort. "Give me your 
position," the destroyer would ask. "What is the name of 
your assistant surgeon, and who is his friend on board our 
ship?" the suspicious vessel would reply — such precaution 
being necessary to give assurance that the query had not 
come from a German submarine. "Being pursued by a 
submarine Lat. 50 N., Long. 15 W." — cries of distress like 
this were common. Another message would tell of a vessel 
that was being shelled; another would tell of a ship that was 
sinking; while other messages would give the location of life- 
boats which were filled with survivors and ask for speedy 
help. Our wireless operators not only received the news 
of friends, but also the messages of enemies. Conversations 
between German submarines frequently filled the air. They 
sometimes attempted to deceive us by false "S. O. S." signals, 
hoping that in this way they could get an opportunity to 
torpedo any vessel that responded to the call. But these 
attempts were unsuccessful, for our wireless operators had 
no difficulty in recognizing the "spark" of the German in- 
struments. At times the surface of the ocean might be 
calm; there would not be a ship in sight or a sign of human 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 121 

existence anywhere; yet the air itself would be uninterrupt- 
edly filled with these reminders of war. 

The duties of our destroyers, in these earliest days, were to 
hunt for submarines, to escort single ships, to pick up sur- 
vivors in boats, and to go to the rescue of ships that were 
being attacked. For the purpose of patrol the sea was 
divided into areas thirty miles square; and to each of these 
one destroyer, sloop, or other vessel was assigned. The ship 
was required to keep within its allotted area, unless the 
pursuit of a submarine should lead it into a neighboring one. 
This patrol, as I have described, was not a satisfactory way of 
fighting submarines. A vessel would occasionally get a 
distant glimpse of the enemy, but that was all; as soon as the 
U-boat saw the ship, it simply dived to security beneath the 
waves. Our destroyers had many chances to fire at the 
enemy but usually at very long ranges; some of them had 
lively scraps, which perhaps involved the destruction of 
U-boats, though this was always a diificult thing to prove. 
Yet the mere fact that submarines were seldom sunk by 
destroyers on patrol, either by ourselves or by the Allies, did 
not mean that the latter accomplished nothing. The work 
chiefly expected of destroyers on patrol was that they 
should keep the U-boats under the surface as much as 
possible and protect commerce. Normally the submarine 
sails on top of the water, looking for its prey. As long as it is 
beyond the merchantmen's range of vision, it uses its high 
surface speed of about 14 knots to attain a position ahead of 
the advancing vessel ; before the surface vessel reaches a point 
where its lookout can see the submarine, the U-boat dives 
and awaits the favorable moment for firing its torpedo. It 
cannot take these preliminary steps if there is a destroyer 
anywhere in the neighborhood; the mere presence of such a 
warship therefore constitutes a considerable protection to any 
merchant ship that is within sight. The submarine normally 
prefers to use its guns on merchant ships, for the torpedoes 
are expensive and comparatively few in number. Destroyers 



122 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

constantly interfered with these gunning operations. A long- 
distance shot usually was suificient to make the under-water 
vessel submerge and thus lose its power for doing harm. The 
early experiences of our destroyers with submarines were of 
this kind; but the work of chasing U-boats under the water, 
escorting a small proportion of the many cargo ships, and 
picking up survivors, important as it was, did not really 
constitute effective anti-submarine warfare. It gave our 
men splendid training, it saved many a merchant ship, it 
rescued many victims from the extreme dangers of German 
ruthlessness, it sank a small number of submarines, but it 
could never have won the war. 

This patrol by destroyers and light surface vessels has been 
criticised as affording an altogether ineffective method of pro- 
tecting shipping, especially when compared with the convoy 
system. This criticism is, of course, justified; still we must 
understand that it was the only possible method until we had 
enough anti-submarine craft to make the convoy practicable. 
Nor must we forget that this Queenstown patrol was organ- 
ized systematically and operated with admirable skill and 
tireless energy. Most of this duty fell at this time upon the 
British destroyers, sloops, and other patrol vessels, which 
were under the command of Admiral Bayly, and these opera- 
tions were greatly aided by the gallant actions of the British 
Q-ships, or "mystery ships." Though some of the admir- 
able exploits of these vessels will be recorded in due time, it 
may be said here that the record which these ships made was 
not only in all respects worthy of the traditions of their great 
service, but also that they exhibited an endurance, a gal- 
lantry, and seamanlike skill that has few parallels in the 
history of naval warfare. 

II 

THE headquarters of the convoy system was a room 
in the British Admiralty; herein was the mainspring of 
the elaborate mechanism by which ten thousand ships 
were routed over the seven oceans. Here every morn- 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 123 

ing those who had been charged with the security of the 
Allies' lines of communication reviewed the entire submarine 
situation. Vice-Admiral Sir Alexander L. Duff, R. N., bore 
this heavy responsibility, ably assisted by a number of 
British officers. Captain Byron A. Long, U. S. N., a member 
of my staff, was associated with Admiral Duff in this im- 
portant work. It was Captain Long's duty to coordinate the 
movements of our convoys with the much more numerous 
convoys of the Allies; he performed this task so efficiently 
that, once the convoy organization was in successful opera- 
tion, I eliminated the whole subject from my anxieties and 
requested Captain Long not to inform me when troop 
convoys sailed from the United States or when they were due 
to arrive in France or England. There seemed to be no 
reason why both of us should lose sleep over the same cause. 

The most conspicuous feature of the convoy room was a 
huge chart, entirely covering the wall on one side of the 
office; access to this chart was obtained by ladders not unlike 
those which are used in shoe stores. It gave a comprehensive 
view of the North and South American coast, the Atlantic 
Ocean, the British Isles, and a considerable part of Europe 
and Africa. The ports which it especially emphasized were 
Sydney (Cape Breton), Halifax, New York, Hampton Roads, 
Gibraltar, and Sierra Leone and Dakar, ports on the west coast 
of Africa. Thin threads were stretched from each one of 
these seven points to certain positions in the ocean just out- 
side the British Isles, and on these threads were little paper 
boats, each one of which represented a convoy. When a 
particular convoy started from New York, one of these paper 
boats was placed at that point; as it made its way across the 
ocean, the boat was moved from day to day in accordance 
with the convoy's progress. At any moment, therefore, a 
mere glance at this chart, with its multitude of paper boats, 
gave the spectator the precise location of all the commerce 
which was then enroute to the scene of war. 

But there were other exhibits on the chart which were even 



124 



THE VICTORY AT SEA 



more conspicuous than these minute representations of 
convoys. Little circles were marked off in the waters sur- 
rounding the British Isles, each one of which was intended to 
show the location of a German submarine. From day to 
day each one of these circles was moved in accordance with 
the ascertained positions of the submarine which it repre- 




A TYPICAL SITUATION WITH 
FOUR DAYS PLOTTINGS' 



6tm«»L etOTiKt ce.iKC .«.• 



AN ADMIRALTY RECORD OF SUBMARINE MOVEMENTS 
The Allied navies kept close and accurate account of the movements of German 
submarines. The convoy officers knew every time one left its base, which one it 
was, and usually all essential details concerning its type and its crew. At any 
time they could tell approximately where all the German submarines were oper- 
ating. A diagram was made daily showing the approximate location of every 
German submarine then at sea. The above is one of these Admiralty maps, 
showing the movements of the submarines for four days. 

sented, a straight Hne indicating its course on the chart. 
Perhaps the most remarkable fact about the Allied convoy 
service was the minute information which it possessed about 
the movements of German submarines. A kind of separate 
intelligence bureau devoted its entire attention to this 
subject. Readers of detective stories are familiar with the 
phenomenon known as "shadowing." It is a common 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 125 

practice in the detective's fascinating profession to assign a 
man, known as a "shadow," to the duty of keeping a par- 
ticular person under constant observation. With admirable 
patience and skill an experienced "shadow" keeps in view 
this object of his attention for twenty-four hours; he dogs 
him through crowded streets, tracks him up and down high 
office buildings, accompanies him to restaurants, trolley 
cars, theatres, and hotels, and unobtrusively chases him 
through dense thoroughfares in cabs and automobiles. "We 
get him up in the morning and we put him to bed at night" 
is the way the "shadow" describes the assiduous care which 
he bestows upon his unsuspecting victim. In much the same 
fashion did the AlHed secret service "shadow" German sub- 
marines; it got each submarine "up in the morning and put 
it to bed at night." That is to say, the intelligence depart- 
ment took charge of Fritz and his crew as they emerged 
from their base, and kept an unwearied eye upon them until 
they sailed back home. The great chart in the convoy room 
of the Admiralty showed, within the reasonable limits of 
human fallibility, where each submarine was operating at a 
particular moment, and it also kept minute track of its 
performances. 

Yet it was not so difficult to gather this information as may 
at first be supposed. I have already said that there were 
comparatively few submarines, perhaps not more than an 
average of eight or nine, which were operating at the same 
time in the waters south and west of Ireland, the region with 
which we Americans were most concerned. These boats 
betrayed their locations in a multitude of ways. Their 
commanders were particularly careless in the use of wireless. 
The Germanic passion for conversation could not be sup- 
pressed even on the U-boats, even though this national 
habit might lead to the most serious consequences. Possibly 
also the solitary submarine felt lonely; at any rate, as soon as 
it reached the Channel or the North Sea, it started an almost 
uninterrupted flow of talk. The U-boats communicated 



126 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

principally with each other, and also with the Admiralty at 
home; and, in doing this, they gave away their positions to 
the assiduously listening Allies. The radio-direction finder, 
an apparatus by which we can instantaneously locate the 
position from which a wireless message is sent, was the 
mechanism which furnished us much of this information. Of 
course, the Germans knew that their messages revealed 
their locations, for they had direction finders as well as we, 
but the fear of discovery did not act as a curb upon a natur- 
ally loquacious nature. And we had other ways of following 
their movements. The submarine spends much the larger 
part of its time on the surface. Sailing thus conspicuously, 
it was constantly being sighted by merchant or military 
ships, which had explicit instructions to report immedi- 
ately the elusive vessel, and to give its exact location. Again 
it is obvious that a submarine could not fire at a merchant- 
man or torpedo one, or even attempt to torpedo one, without 
revealing its presence. The wireless operators of all mer- 
chant vessels were supplied at all times with the longitude 
and latitude of their ships; their instructions required them 
immediately to send out this information whenever they 
sighted a submarine or were attacked by one. In these 
several ways we had little difficulty in "shadowing" the 
U-boats. For example, we would hear that the U-^^ was 
talking just outside of Heligoland; this submarine would be 
immediately plotted on the chart. As the submarine made 
only about ten knots on the surface, in order to save fuel oil, 
and much less under the surface, we could draw a circle 
around this point, and rest assured that the boat must be 
somewhere within this circle at a given time. But in a few 
hours or a day we would hear from this same boat again; 
perhaps it was using its wireless or attacking a merchantman; 
or perhaps one of our vessels had spotted it on the surface. 
The news of this new location would justify the convoy 
officers in moving this submarine on our chart to this new 
position. Within a short time the convoy officers acquired 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 127 

an astonishingly intimate knowledge of these boats and the 
habits of their commanders. Indeed, the personalities of 
some of these German officers ultimately took shape with 
surprising clearness; for they betrayed their presence in the 
ocean by characteristics that often furnished a means of 
identifying them. Each submarine behaved in a different 
way from the others, the difference, of course, representing 
the human element in control. One would deliver his 
attacks in rapid succession, boldly and almost recklessly; 
another would approach his task with the utmost caution; 
certain ones would display the meanest traits in human 
nature; while others — let us be just — were capable of a cer- 
tain display of generosity, and possibly even of chivalry. By 
studying the individual traits of each commander we could 
often tell just which one* was operating at a given time; and 
this information was extremely valuable in the game in 
which we were engaged. 

"Old Hans is out again," the officers in the convoy room 
would remark. 

They were speaking of Hans Rose, the commander of the 
U-$j; this was that same submarine officer who, in the fall 
of 19 1 6, brought that boat to Newport, Rhode Island, 
and torpedoed five or six ships off Nantucket. Our men 
never saw Hans Rose face to face; they had not the 
faintest idea whether he was fat or lean, whether he was 
fair or dark; yet they knew his military characteristics in- 
timately. He became such a familiar personality in the 
convoy room and his methods of operation were so individual, 
that we came to have almost a certain liking for the old chap. 
Other U-boat commanders would appear off the hunting 
grounds and attack ships in more or less easy-going fashion. 
Then another boat would suddenly appear, and — bang! 
bang! bang! Torpedo after torpedo would fly, four or five 
ships would sink, and then this disturbing person would 
vanish as unexpectedly as he had arrived. Such an ex- 
perience informed the convoy officers that Hans Rose was 



12^ THE VICTORY AT SEA 

once more at large. We acquired a certain respect for Hans 
because he was a brave man who would take chances which 
most of his compatriots would avoid; and, above all, because 
he played his desperate game with a certain decency. Some- 
times, when he torpedoed a ship. Rose would wait around 
until all the lifeboats were filled; he would then throw out a 
tow line, give the victims food, and keep all the survivors to- 
gether until the rescuing destroyer appeared on the horizon, 
when he would let go and submerge. This humanity in- 
volved considerable risk to Captain Rose, for a destroyer any- 
where in his neighborhood, as he well knew, was a serious 
matter. It was he who torpedoed our destroyer, the Jacob 
Jones. He took a shot at her from a distance of two miles — 
a distance from which a hit is a pure chance; and the torpedo 
struck and sank the vessel within a few minutes. On this 
occasion Rose acted with his usual decency. The survivors 
of the Jacob Jones naturally had no means of communication, 
since the wireless had gone down with their ship; and now 
Rose, at considerable risk to himself, sent out an "S. O. S." 
call, giving the latitude and longitude, and informing Queens- 
town that the men were floating around in open boats. It is 
perhaps not surprising that Rose is one of the few German 
U-boat commanders with whom Allied naval officers would 
be willing to-day to shake hands. I have heard naval officers 
say that they would like to meet him after the war. 

We were able to individualize other commanders; the 
business of acquiring this knowledge, learning the location of 
their submarines and the characteristics of their boats, and 
using this vital information in protecting convoys, was all 
part of the game which was being played in London. 1 1 was 
the greatest game of "chess" which history has known — a 
game that exacted not only the most faithful and studious 
care, but one in which it was necessary that all the activities 
should be centralized in one office. This small group of 
officers in the Admiralty convoy room, composed of repre- 
sentatives of all the nations concerned, exercised a control 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 129 

which extended throughout the entire convoy system. It 
regulated the dates when convoys sailed from America or 
other ports and when they arrived; if it had not taken charge 
of this whole system, congestion and confusion would inevi- 
tably have resulted. We had only a limited number of de- 
stroyers to escort all troops and other important convoys 
arriving in Europe; it was therefore necessary that they * 
should arrive at regular and predetermined intervals. It was 
necessary also that one group of officers should control the 
routing of all convoys, otherwise there would have been 
serious danger of collisions between outward and inward 
bound ships, and no possibility of routing them clear of the 
known positions of submarines. The great centre of all this 
traffic was not New York or Hampton Roads, but London. 
It was inevitable, if the convoy system was to succeed, that 
it should have a great central headquarters, and it was just 
as inevitable that this headquarters should be London. 

On the huge chart already described the convoys, each 
indicated by a little boat, were shown steadily making their 
progress toward the appointed rendezvous. Eight or nine 
submarines, likewise indicated on the chart, were always 
waiting to intercept them. On that great board the 
prospective tragedies of the seas were thus unfolding before 
our eyes. Here, for example, was a New York convoy of 
twenty ships, steaming toward Liverpool, but steering 
straight toward the position of a submarine. The thing to 
do was perfectly plain. It was a simple matter to send the 
convoy a wireless message to take a course fifty miles to the 
south where, according to the chart, there were no hidden 
enemies. In a few hours the little paper boat, which repre- 
sented this group of ships and which was apparently headed 
for destruction, would suddenly turn southward, pass around 
the entirely unconscious submarine, and then take an unob- 
structed course for its destination. The Admiralty convoy 
board knew so accurately the position of all the submarines 
that it could almost always roiite the convoys around them. 



130 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

It was an extremely interesting experience to watch the 
paper ships on this chart deftly turn out of the course of 
U-boats, sometimes when they seemed almost on the point of 
colliding with them. That we were able constantly to save 
the ships by sailing the convoys around the submarines 
brings out the interesting fact that, even had there been no 
destroyer escort, the convoy in itself would have formed a 
great protection to merchant shipping. There were times 
when we had no escorting vessels to send with certain con- 
voys; and in such instances we simply routed the ships in 
masses, directed them on courses which we knew were free of 
submarines, and in this way brought them safely into port. 

Ill 

THE Admiralty in London was thus the central nerv- 
ous system of a complicated but perfectly working 
organism which reached the remotest corners of the world. 
Wherever there was a port, whether in South America, 
Australia, or in the rnost inaccessible parts of India or 
China, from which merchantmen sailed to any of the other 
countries which were involved in the war, representatives 
of the British navy and the British Government were 
stationed, all working harmoniously with shipping men 
in the effort to get their cargoes safely through the danger 
zones. These danger zones occupied a comparatively small 
area surrounding the belligerent countries, but the safeguard- 
ing of the ships was an elaborate process which began far back 
in the countries from which the commerce started. Until 
about July, 1917, the world's shipping for the most part had 
been unregulated; now for the first time it was arranged in 
hard and fast routes and despatched in accordance with 
schedules as fixed as those of a great railroad. The whole 
management of convoys, indeed, bore many resemblances to 
the method of handling freight cars on the American system 
of trans-continental lines. In the United States there are 
several great headquarters of freight, sometimes known as 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 131 

"gateways," places, that is, at which freight cars are assem- 
bled from a thousand places, and from which the great 
accumulations are routed to their destinations. Such places 
are Pittsburg, Buffalo, St. Louis, Chicago, Minneapolis, 
Denver, San Francisco — to mention only a few. Shipping 




ROUTES OF THE CONVOYS 
This diagram shows the courses of world commerce under the convoy system. 
The great ports of Sydney, Halifax, New York, and Hampton Roads in North Amer- 
ica; of Gibraltar in Europe; and Dakar and Sierra Leone in Africa, were the places 
where shipping destined for Entente nations was formed into convoys. Thus, all 
ships from the west coast of South America, the Gulf of Mexico, and southern ports 
of the United States had to sail first to Hampton Roads where they were formed 
into a convoy and sent across the ocean to the war zone. When the system got 
into perfect working order, these convoys sailed on a rigid time-table like railroad 
trains. 



destined for the belligerent nations was similarly assembled, 
in the years 191 7 and 191 8, at six or eight great ocean "gate- 
ways," and there formed into convoys for "through routing" 
to the British Isles, France, and the Mediterranean. Only a 
few of the ships that were exceptionally fast — speed in itself 



132 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

being a particularly efficacious protection against submarines 
— ^were permitted to ignore this routing system, and dash 
unprotected through the infested area. This was a some- 
what dangerous procedure even for such ships, however, and 
they were escorted whenever destroyers were available. All 
other vessels, from whatever parts of the world they might 
come, were required to sail first for one of these great as- 
sembling points, or "gateways"; and at these places they 
were added to one of the constantly forming convoys. Thus 
all shipping which normally sailed to Europe around the 
Cape of Good Hope proceeded up the west coast of Africa 
until it reached the port of Dakar or Sierra Leone, where it 
joined the convoy. Shipping from the east coast of South 
America — ports like Rio de Janeiro, Bahia, Buenos Aires, and 
Montevideo — instead of sailing directly to Europe, joined 
the convoy at this same African town. Vessels which came 
to Britain and Fraitce by way of Suez and Mediterranean 
ports found their great stopping place at Gibraltar — a 
headquarters of traffic which, in the huge amount of freight 
which it "created," became almost the Pittsburg of this 
mammoth transportation system. The four "gateways" 
for North America and the west coast of South America were 
Sydney (Cape Breton), Halifax, New York, and Hampton 
Roads. The grain-laden merchantmen from the St. Lawr- 
ence valley rendezvoused at Sydney and Halifax. Vessels 
from Portland, Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and other 
Atlantic points found their assembling headquarters at New 
York, while ships from Baltimore, Norfolk, the Gulf of 
Mexico, and the west coast of South America proceeded to 
the great convoy centre which had been established at Hamp- 
ton Roads. 

In the convoy room of the Admnralty these aggregations 
of ships were always referred to as the " Dakar convoy," the 
"Halifax convoy," the "Hampton Roads convoy," and the 
like. When the system was completely established the con- 
voys sailed from their appointed headquarters on regular 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 133 

schedules, like railroad trains. From New York one convoy 
departed every sixteen days for the west coast of England 
and one left every sixteen days for the east coast. From 
Hampton Roads one sailed every eight days to the west coast 
and one every eight days to the east coast, and convoys from 
all the other convoy points maintained a similarly rigid 
schedule. The dates upon which these sailings took place 
were fixed, like the arrivals and departures of trains upon a 
railroad time-table, except when it became necessary to de- 
lay the sailing of a convoy to avoid congestion of arrivals. 
According to this programme, the first convoy to the west 
coast left New York on August 14, 191 7, and its successors 
thereafter sailed at intervals of about sixteen days. The in- 
structions sent to shipmasters all over the world, by way of 
the British consulates, gave explicit details concerning the 
method of assembling their convoys. 

Here, for example, was a ship at New York, all loaded and 
ready to sail for the war zone. The master visited the port 
officer at the British consulate, who directed him to proceed 
to Gravesend Bay, anchor his vessel, and report to the con- 
voy officers for further instructions. The merchant captain, 
reaching this indicated spot, usually found several other 
vessels on hand, all of them, like his ship, waiting for the 
sailing date. The commander of the gathering convoy, 
under whose instructions all the merchantmen were to oper- 
ate, was a naval officer, usually of the rank of commodore or 
captain, who maintained constant cable communication 
with the convoy room of the Admiralty and usually used one 
of the commercial vessels as his flagship. When the sailing 
day arrived usually from twenty to thirty merchantmen had 
assembled; the commander summoned all their masters, gave 
each a blue book containing instructions for the management 
of convoyed ships, and frequently delivered something in the 
nature of a lecture. Before the aggregation sailed it was 
joined by a cruiser or pre-dreadnaught battleship of the Amer- 
ican navy, or by a British or French cruiser. This ship was 



134 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

to accompany the convoy across the Atlantic as far as the 
danger zone; its mission was not, as most people mistakenly 
believed, to protect the convoy from submarines, but to 
protect it from any surface German raider that might have 
escaped into the high seas. The Allied navies constantly 
had before their minds the exploits of the Emden; the oppor- 
tunity to break up a convoy in midocean by daredevil enter- 
prises of this kind was so tempting that it seemed altogether 
likely that Germany might take advantage of it. To send 
twenty or thirty merchant ships across the Atlantic with no 
protection against such assaults would have been to invite a 
possible disaster. As a matter of fact, the last German raider 
that even attempted to gain the high seas was sunk in the 
North Sea by the British Patrol Squadron in February, 191 7. 
On the appointed day the whole convoy weighed anchor 
and silently slipped out to sea. To such spectators as ob- 
served its movements it seemed to be a rather limping, halt- 
ing procession. The speed of a convoy was the speed of its 
slowest ship, and vessels that could easily make twelve or four- 
teen knots were obliged to throttle down their engines, much 
to the disgust of their masters, in order to keep formation with 
a ship that made only eight or ten ; though whenever possible 
vessels of nearly equal speed sailed together. Little in the 
newly assembled group suggested the majesty of the sea. The 
ships formed a miscellaneous and ill-assorted company, rusty 
tramps shamefacedly sailing alongside of spick-and-span 
liners; miserable little two- or three-thousand ton ships at- 
tempting to hold up their heads in the same company with 
other ships of ten or twelve. The whole mass was sprawled 
over the sea in most ungainly fashion; twenty or thirty ships, 
with spaces of nine hundred or a thousand yards stretching 
between them, took up not far from ten square miles of 
the ocean surface. Neither at this stage of the voyage did 
the aggregation give the idea of efficiency. It presented 
about as desirable a target as the submarine could have de- 
sired. But the period taken in crossing the ocean was en- 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 135 

tirely devoted to education. Under the tutorship of the 
convoy commander, the men composing the twenty or thirty 
crews went every day to school. For fifteen or twenty days 
upon the broad Atlantic they were trained in all the evolu- 
tions which were necessary for coping with the submarine. 
Every possible situation that could arise in the danger zone 
was anticipated and the officers and the crews were trained 
to meet it. They perfected themselves in the signal code; 
they learned the art of making the sudden manoeuvres which 
were instantaneously necessary when a submarine was 
sighted; they acquired a mastery in the art of zigzagging; 
and they became accustomed to sailing at night without 
lights. The crews were put through all the drills which pre- 
pared them to meet such crises as the landing of a torpedo 
in their engine-room or the sinking of the ship; and they were 
thoroughly schooled in getting all hands safely into the boats. 
Possibly an occasional scare on the way over may have in- 
troduced the element of reality into these exercises; though 
no convoys actually met submarines in the open ocean, the 
likelihood that they might do so was never absent, especially 
after the Germans began sending out their huge under-water 
cruisers. 

The convoy commander left his port with sealed orders, 
which he was instructed not to open until he was a hundred 
miles at sea. These orders, when the seal was broken, gave 
him the rendezvous assigned by Captain Long of the convoy 
board in London. The great chart in the convoy room at 
the Admiralty indicated the point to which the convoy was 
to proceed and at which it would be met by the destroyer 
escorts and taken through the danger zone. This particular 
New York convoy commander was now perhaps instructed 
to cross the thirtieth meridian at the fifty-second parallel of 
latitude, where he would be met by his escort. He laid his 
course for that point and regulated his speed so as to reach 
it at the appointed time. But he well knew that these in- 
structions were only temporary. The precise point to which 



136 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

he would finally be directed to sail depended upon the move- 
ment and location of the German submarines at the time of 
his arrival. If the enemy became particularly active in the 
region of this tentative rendezvous, then, as the convoy ap- 
proached it, a wireless from London would instruct the 
commander to steer abruptly to another point, perhaps a 
hundred miles to north or south. 

"Getting your convoy" was a searching test of destroyer 
seamanship, particularly in heavy or thick weather. It was 
not the simplest thing to navigate a group of destroyers 
through the tempestuous waters of the North Atlantic, with 
no other objective than the junction point of a certain 
meridian and parallel, and reach the designated spot at a 
certain hour. Such a feat demanded navigation ability of a 
high order; and the skill which our American naval officers 
displayed in this direction aroused great admiration, espe- 
cially on the part of the merchant skippers; in particular it 
aroused the astonishment of the average doughboy. Many 
destroyer escorts that went out to meet an incoming convoy 
also took out one which was westward bound. A few mis- 
haps in the course of the war, such as the sinking of the Jus- 
ticia, which was sailing from Europe to America, created the 
false notion that outward-bound convoys were not escorted. 
It was just as desirable, of course, to escort the ships going 
out as it was to escort those which were coming in. The 
mere fact that the inbound ships carried troops and supplies 
gave stronger reasons, from the humane standpoint, for 
heavier escorts, but not from the standpoint of the general 
war situation. The Germans were not sinking our ships 
because they were carrying men and supplies; they were 
sinking them simply because they were ships. They were 
not seeking to destroy American troops and munitions ex- 
clusively; they were seeking to destroy tonnage. They 
were aiming to reduce the world's supply of ships to such a 
point that the Allies would be compelled to abandon the con- 
flict for lack of communications. It was therefore necessary 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 137 

that they should sink the empty ships, which were going out, 
as well as the crowded and loaded ships which were coming 
in. For the same reason it was necessary that we should 
protect them, and we did this as far as practicable without 
causing undue delays in forming outward-bound convoys. 
The Justicia, though most people still think that she was 
torpedoed because she was unescorted, was, in fact, protected 
by a destroyer escort of considerable size. This duty of 
escorting outward-bound ships increased considerably the 
strain on our destroyer force. The difficulty was that the 
inbound convoy arrived in a body, but that the ships could 
not be unloaded and sent back in a body without detaining 
a number of them an undue length of time — and time was 
such an important factor in this war that it was necessary 
to make the "turn-around" of each important transport as 
quickly as possible. The consequence was that returning 
ships were often despatched in small convoys as fast as 
they were unloaded. The escorts which we were able to 
supply for such groups were thus much weaker than absolute 
safety required, and sometimes we were even forced to send 
vessels across the submarine zone with few, if any, escorting 
warships. This explains why certain homeward-bound 
transports were torpedoed, and this was particularly true of 
troop and munition convoys to the western ports of France. 
Only when we could assemble a large outgoing convoy and 
despatch it at such a time that it could meet an incoming 
one at the western edge of the submarine zone could we give 
these vessels the same destroyer escort as that which we al- 
ways gave for the loaded convoys bound for European ports. 
As soon as the destroyers made contact with an inward- 
bound convoy, the ocean escort, the cruiser or pre-dread- 
naught, if an American, abandoned it and started back home, 
sometimes with a westbound convoy if one had been assem- 
bled in time. British escorts went ahead at full speed into a 
British port, usually escorted by one or more destroyers. 
This abandonment sometimes aroused the wrath of the 



138 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

passengers on the inbound convoy. Their protector had 
dropped them just as they had entered the submarine zone, 
the very moment its services were really needed! These 
passengers did not understand, any more than did the people 
at home, that the purpose of the ocean escort was not to pro- 
tect them from submarines, but from possible raiders. In- 
side the danger zone this ocean escort would become part 
of the convoy itself and require protection from submarines, 
so that its rather summary departure really made the mer- 
chantmen more secure. As the convoy approached the 
danger zone, after being drilled all the way across the ocean, 
its very appearance was more taut and businesslike. The 
ships were closed up into a much more compact formation, 
keeping only such distances apart as were essential for quick 
manoeuvring. Generally the convoy was formed in a long 
parallelogram, the distance across the front of which was 
much longer than the depth or distance along the sides. 
Usually the formation was a number of groups of four vessels 
each, in column or "Indian file," at a distance of about five 
hundred yards from ship to ship, and all groups abreast of 
each other and about one half mile apart. Thus a convoy 
of twenty-four vessels, or six groups of four, would have 
a width of about three miles and a depth of one. Most of the 
destroyers were stationed on the narrow sides, for it was only 
on the side, or the beam, that the submarines could attack 
with much likelihood of succeeding. It was usually neces- 
sary for a destroyer to be stationed in the rear of a convoy, 
for, though the speed of nearly all convoys was faster than 
that of a submarine when submerged, the latter while running 
on the surface could follow a convoy at night with a fair 
chance of torpedoing a vessel at early daylight and escaping 
to the rear if unhampered by the presence of a rear-guard 
destroyer. It was generally impracticable and dangerous 
for the submarine to wait ahead, submerge, and launch its 
torpedoes as the convoy passed over it. The extent to which 
purely mechanical details protected merchant ships is not 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 139 

understood, and this inability to attack successfully from the 
front illustrates this point. The submarine launches its 
torpedoes from tubes in the bow or stern ; it has no tubes on 
the beam. If it did possess such side tubes, it could lie in 




ROUTES OF THE CONVOYS 
This diagram shows the routes which the convoys took after they reached the 
danger zone. The solid lines represent in bound convoys and the dotted lines out- 
bound convoys. All convoys entered by means of one of the "trunk lines," but 
after reaching a certain point took a "branch" route to its port in France or the 
United Kingdom. 

wait ahead and shoot its broadsides at the convoy as it passed 
over the spot where it was concealed. Its length in that 
case would be parallel to that of the merchant ships, and thus 
it would have a comparatively small part of its area exposed 



140 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

to the danger of ramming The mere fact that its torpedo 
tubes are placed in the bow and stern makes it necessary for 
the submarine, if it wishes to attack in the fashion described, 
to turn almost at right angles to the course of the convoy, 
and to manoeuvre into a favorable position from which to 
discharge its missile — a procedure so altogether hazardous 
that it almost never attempts it. With certain reservations, 
which it is hardly necessary to explain in detail at this 
point, it may be taken at least as a general rule that the 
sides of the convoy not only furnish the U-boats much 
the best chance to torpedo ships, but also subject them 
to the least danger; and this is the reason why, in the 
recent war, the destroyers were usually concentrated at these 
points. 

I have already compared the convoy system to a great 
aggregation of railroads. This comparison holds good of its 
operation after it had entered the infested zone. Indeed the 
very terminology of our railroad men was used. Every con- 
voy nearly followed one of two main routes, known at convoy 
headquarters as the two "trunk lines." The trunk line 
which reached the west coast of England usually passed 
north of Ireland through the North Channel and down the 
Irish Sea to Liverpool. Under certain conditions these con- 
voys passed south of Ireland and thence up the Irish Sea. 
The convoys to the east coast took a trunk line that passed 
up the English Channel. Practically all shipping from the 
United States to Great Britain and France took one of these 
trunk lines. But, like our railroad systems, each of these 
main routes had branch lines. Thus shipping destined for 
French ports took the southern route until off the entrance 
to the English Channel; here it abandoned the main line and 
took a branch route to Brest, Bordeaux, Nantes, and other 
French ports. In the Channel likewise several " single-track" 
branches went to various English ports, such as Plymouth, 
Portsmouth, Southampton, and the like. The whole gigantic 
enterprise flowed with a precision and a regularity which I 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 141 

think it is hardly likely that any other transportation system 
has ever achieved. 

IV 

A DESCRIPTION of a few actual convoys, and the ex- 
periences of our destroyers with them, will perhaps 
best make clear the nature of the mechanism which protected 
the world's shipping. For this purpose I have selected typi- 
cal instances which illustrate the every-day routine ex- 
periences of escorting destroyers, and other experiences in 
which their work was more spectacular. 

One day in late October, 19 17, a division of American de- 
stroyers at Queenstown received detailed instructions from 
Admiral Bayly to leave at a certain hour and escort the out- 
ward convoy "O Q 17" and bring into port the inbound con- 
voy "H S 14." These detailed instructions were based upon 
general instructions issued from the Admiralty, where my 
staff was in constant attendance and cooperation. The 
symbols by which these two groups of ships were designated 
can be easily interpreted. The O Q simply meant that con- 
voy "No 17" — the seventeenth which had left that port — 
was Outward bound from Queenstown, and the H S signified 
that convoy "No. 14" was Homeward bound from Sydney, 
Cape Breton. Queenstown during the first few months 
was one of those places at which ships, having discharged 
their cargoes, assembled in groups for despatching back to 
the United States. Later Milford Haven, Liverpool, and 
other ports, were more often used for this purpose. Vessels 
had been arriving here for several days from ports of the 
Irish Sea and the east coast of England. These had now 
been formed into convoy "O Q 17"; they were ready for a 
destroyer escort to take them through the submarine 
zone and start them on the westward voyage to American 
ports. 

This escort consisted of eight American destroyers and 
one British "special service ship"; the latter was one of 



142 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

that famous company of decoy vessels, or "mystery ships," 
which, though to all outward appearances unprotected 
merchantmen, really carried concealed armament of sufficient 
power to destroy any submarine that came within range. 
This special service ship, the Auhrietia, was hardly a member 
of the protective escort. Her mission was to sail about thirty 
miles ahead of the convoy; when observed from the periscope 
or the conning tower of a submarine, the Auhrietia seemed 
to be merely a helpless merchantman sailing alone, and as 
such she presented a particularly tempting target to the U- 
boat. But her real purpose in life was to be torpedoed. 
After landing its missile in a vessel's side, the submarine us- 
ually remained submerged for a period, while the crew of its 
victim was getting off in boats; it then came to the surface, 
and the men prepared to board the disabled ship and search 
her for valuables and delicacies, particularly for information 
which would assist them in their campaign, such as secret 
codes, sailing instructions, and the like. The mystery ship 
had been preparing for this moment and as soon as the sub- 
marine broke water, the gun ports of the disguised merchant- 
man dropped, and her hitherto concealed guns began blazing 
away at the German. By October, 191 7, these special ser- 
vice ships had already accounted for several submarines; and 
it had now become a frequent practice to attach one or more 
to a convoy, either ahead, where she might dispose of the 
submarine lying in wait for the approaching aggregation, or 
in the rear, where a U-boat might easily mistake her for one 
of those stragglers which were an almost inevitable part of 
every convoy. 

Trawlers and mine-sweepers, as was the invariable custom, 
spent several hours sweeping the Queenstown Channel before 
the sailing of convoy "O Q 17" and its escort. Promptly 
at the appointed time the eight American ships sailed out in 
" Indian file," passing through the net which was always kept 
in place at the entrance to the harbor. Their first duty was 
to patrol the waters outside for a radius of twelve miles; it 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 143 

was not improbable that the Germans, having learned that 
this convoy was to sail, had stationed a submarine not far 
from the harbor entrance. Having finally satisfied himself 
that there were no lurking enemies in the neighborhood, the 
commander of the destroyer flagship signalled to the mer- 
chant ships, which promptly left the harbor and entered the 
open sea. The weather was stormy; the wind was blowing 
something of a gale and head seas were breaking over the 
destroyers' decks. But the convoy quickly manoeuvred into 
three columns, the destroyers rapidly closed around them, 
and the whole group started for " Rendezvous A" — this being 
the designation of that spot on the ocean's surface where the 
fourteenth meridian of longitude crossed the forty-ninth 
parallel of latitude — a point in the Atlantic about three hun- 
dred miles southwest of Queenstown, regarded at that time 
as safely beyond the operating zone of the submarine. 
Meanwhile, the "mystery ship," sailing far ahead, disap- 
peared beneath the horizon. 

Convoying ships in the stormy fall and winter waters, 
amid the fog and rain of the eastern Atlantic, was a monoto- 
nous and dreary occupation. Only one or two incidents en- 
livened this particular voyage. As the Parker, Commander 
Halsey Powell, was scouting ahead at about two o'clock in 
the afternoon, her lookout suddenly sighted a submarine 
bearing down upon the convoy. Immediately the news was 
wirelessed to every vessel. As soon as the message was 
received, the whole convoy, at a signal from the flagship, 
turned four points to the left. For nearly two hours the 
destroyers searched this area for the submerged submarine, 
but that crafty boat kept itself safely under the water, and 
the convoy now again took up its original course. About 
two days' sailing brought the ships to the point at which the 
protecting destroyers could safely leave them, as far as sub- 
marines were concerned, to continue unescorted to America; 
darkness had now set in, and, under its cover, the merchant- 
men slipped away from the warships and started westward. 



144 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Meantime, the destroyer escort had received a message from 
the Cumberland, the British cruiser which was acting as 
ocean escort to convoy "H S 14." "Convoy is six hours 
late," she reported, much Hke the announcer at a railroad 
station who informs the waiting crowds that the incoming 
train is that much overdue. According to the schedule these 
ships should reach the appointed rendezvous at six o'clock 
the next morning; this message evidently moved the time of 
arrival up to noon. The destroyers, slowing down so that 
they would not arrive ahead of time, started for the desig- 
nated spot. 

Sometimes thick weather made it impossible to fix the 
position by astronomical observations, and the convoy 
might not be at its appointed rendezvous. For this reason 
the destroyers now deployed on a north and south line about 
twenty miles long for several hours. Somewhat before the 
appointed time one of the destroyers sighted a faint cloud of 
smoke on the western horizon, and soon afterward thirty- 
two merchantmen, sailing in columns of fours, began to 
assume a definite outline. At a signal from this destroyer 
the other destroyers of the escort came in at full speed and 
ranged themselves on either side of the convoy — a manoeuvre 
that always excited the admiration of the merchant skippers. 
This mighty collection of vessels, occupying about ten or 
twelve square miles on the ocean, skilfully maintaining its 
formation, was really a beautiful and inspiring sight. When 
the destroyers had gained their designated positions on 
either side, the splendid cavalcade sailed boldly into the area 
which formed the favorite hunting grounds for the sub- 
marine. 

As soon as this danger zone was reached the whole aggrega- 
tion, destroyers and merchant ships, began to zigzag. The 
commodore on the flagship hoisted the signal, "Zigzag A," 
and instantaneously the whole thirty-two ships began to turn 
twenty-five degrees to the right. The great ships, usually so 
cumbersome, made this simultaneous turn with all the deft- 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 145 

ness, and even with all the grace of a school of fish into which 
one has suddenly cast a stone. All the way across the 
Atlantic they had been practising such an evolution; most of 
them had already sailed through the danger zone more than 
once, so that the manoeuvre was by this time an old story. 
For ten or fifteen minutes they proceeded along this course, 
when immediately, like one vessel, the convoy turned twenty 
degrees to the left, and started in a new direction. And so on 
for hours, now a few minutes to the right, now a few minutes 
to the left, and now again straight ahead, while all the time 
the destroyers were cutting through the water, every eye of 
the skilled lookouts in each crew fixed upon the surface for 
the first glimpse of a periscope. This zigzagging was carried 
out according to comprehensive plans which enabled the con- 
voy to zigzag for hours at a time without signals, the courses 
and the time on each course being designated in the particular 
plan ordered, all ships' clocks being set exactly alike by time 
signal. Probably I have made it clear why these zigzagging 
evolutions constituted such a protective measure. All the 
time the convoy was sailing in the danger zone it was as- 
sumed that a submarine was present, looking for a chance to 
torpedo. Even though the oificers might know that there 
was no submarine within three hundred miles, this was 
never taken for granted; the discipline of the whole convoy 
system rested upon the theory that the submarine was there, 
waiting only the favorable moment to start the work of 
destruction. But a submarine, as already said, could not 
strike without the most thorough preparation. It must get 
within three or four hundred yards or the torpedo would 
stand little chance of hitting the mark in a vital spot. The 
commander almost never shot blindly into the convoy, on the 
chance of hitting some ship; he carefully selected his victim; 
his calculation had to include its speed, the speed of his own 
boat and that of his torpedo; above all, he had to be sure 
of the direction in which his intended quarry was steaming; 
and in this calculation the direction of the merchantman 



146 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

formed perhaps the most important element. But if the 
ships were constantly changing their direction, it is apparent 
that the submarine could make no calculations which would 
have much practical value. 

In the afternoon the Auhrietia, the British mystery ship 
which was sailing thirty miles ahead of the convoy, reported 
that she had sighted a submarine. Two or three destroyers 
dashed for the indicated area, searched it thoroughly, found 
no traces of the hidden boat, and returned to the convoy. 
The next morning six British destroyers and one cruiser ar- 
rived from Devonport. Up to this time the convoy had been 
following the great "trunk line" which led into the Channel, 
but it had now reached the point where the convoys split up, 
part going to English ports and part to French. These 
British destroyers had come to take over the twenty ships 
which were bound for their own country, while the American 
destroyers were assigned to escort the rest to Brest. The 
following conversation — typical of those that were constantly 
filling the air in that area — now took place between the 
American flagship and the British: 

Conyngham to Achates: This is the Conyngham, Commander 
Johnson. I would like to keep the convoy together until this 
evening. I will work under your orders until I leave with convoy 
for Brest. 

Achates to Conyngham: Please make your own arrangements 
for taking French convoy with you to-night. 

Achates to Conygham: What time do you propose leaving with 
French convoy to-night? 

Conyngham to Achates: About 5 p. m. in order to arrive in 
Brest to-night. 

Devonport Commander-in-chief to Conyngham: Proceed in 
execution Admiralty orders Achates having relieved you. Sub- 
marine activity in Lat. 48-41 Long. 4-51. 

The Auhrietia had already given warning of the danger referred 
to in the last words of this final message. It had been flashing the 
news in this way: 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 147 

I :i5 p. M. Auhrietia to Conyngham: Submarine sighted 40-30 
N 6~S. Sighted submarine on suri'ace. Speed is not enough. 
Course southwest by south magnetic. 

I 30 p. M. Conyngham to Achates: Auhrietia to all men of war 
and Land's End. Chasing submarine on the surface 49-30 N 6-8 
W course southwest by south. Waiting to get into range. He is 
going faster than I can. 

2:00 p. M. Auhrietia to all men of war. Submarine submerged 
49-20 N 6-12 W. Still searching. 

The fact that nothing more was seen of that submarine 
may possibly detract from the thrill of the experience, but in 
describing the operations of this convoy I am not attempting 
to tell a story of wild adventure, but merely to set forth what 
happened ninety-nine out of a hundred times. What made 
destroyer work so exasperating was that, in the vast majority 
of cases, the option of fighting or not fighting lay with the 
submarine. Had the submarine decided to approach and 
attack the convoy, the chances would have been more than 
even that it would have been destroyed. In accordance 
with its usual practice, however, it chose to submerge, and 
that decision ended the affair for the moment. This was the 
way in which merchant ships were protected. At the time 
this submarine was sighted it was headed directly for this 
splendid aggregation of cargo vessels; had not the Auhrietia 
discovered it and had not one of the American destroyers 
started in pursuit, the U-boat woiild have made an attack 
and possibly would have sent one or more ships to the 
bottom. The chief business of the escorting ships, all 
through the war, was this unspectacular one of chasing the 
submarines away; and for every under-water vessel actually 
destroyed there were hundreds of experiences such as the one 
which I have just described. 

The rest of this trip was uneventful. Two American 
destroyers escorted H. M. S. Cumberland — the ocean escort 
which had accompanied the convoy from Sydney — to 
Devonport ; the rest of the American escort took its quota of 



148 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

merchantmen into Brest, and from that point sailed back to 
Queenstown, whence, after three or four days in port, it 
went out with another convoy. This was the routine which 
was repeated until the end of the war. 

The "O Q 17" and the "H S 14" form an illustration of con- 
voys which made their trips successfully. Yet these same 
destroyers had another experience which pictures other 
phases of the convoy system. 

On the morning of October 19th, Commander Johnson's 
division was escorting a great convoy of British ships on its 
way to the east coast of England. Suddenly out of the air 
came one of those calls which were daily occurrences in 
the submarine zone. The J . L. Luckenback signalled her 
position, ninety miles ahead of the convoy, and that she 
was being shelled by a submarine. In a few minutes the 
Nicholson, one of the destroyers of the escort, started to the 
rescue. For the next few hours our ships began to pick out 
of the air the messages which detailed the progress of this 
adventure — messages which tell the story so graphically, 
and which are so typical of the events which were con- 
stantly taking place in those waters, that I reproduce them 
verbatim : 

8:50 A. M. S. O. S. /. L. Luckenback being gunned by sub- 
marine. Position 48.08 N. 9.31 W. 

9:25 Conyngham to Nicholson: Proceed to assistance of S. O. S. 
ship, 

9:30 Luckenback to U. S. A.: Am manoeuvring around. 

9:35 Luckenback to U. S. A.: How far are you away? 

9:40 Luckenback to U. S. A.: Code books thrown overboard. 
How soon will you arrive? 

Nicholson to Luckenback: In two hours. 

9:41 Luckenback to U. S. A. : Look for boats. They are shelling 
us. 

Nicholson to Luckenback: Do not surrender! 

Luckenback to Nicholson: Never! 

11:01 Nicholson to Luckenback: Course south magnetic. 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 149 

12:36 p. M. Nicholson to Conyngham: Submarine submerged 
47.47 N. 10.00 W at 1 1 :20. 

1 :23 Conyngham to Nicholson: What became of steamer? 

3:41 Nicholson to Admiral (at Queenstown) and Conyngham: 
Luckenback now joining convoy. Should be able to make port 
unassisted. 



I have already said that a great part of the destroyer's 
duty was to rescue merchantmen that were being attacked 
by submarines: this Luckenback incident vividly illustrates 
this point. Had the submarine used its torpedo upon this 
vessel, it probably would have disposed of it summarily; but 
it was the part of wisdom for the submarine to economize in 
these weapons because they were so expensive and so com- 
paratively scarce, and to use its guns whenever the oppor- 
tunity offered. The Luckenback was armed, but the fact 
that the submarine's guns easily outranged hers made her 
armament useless. Thus all the German had to do in this 
case was to keep away at a safe distance and bombard the 
merchantman. The U-boat had been doing this for more 
than three hours when the destroyer reached the scene of 
operations; evidently the marksmanship was poor, for out of 
a great many shots fired by the submarine only about a 
dozen had hit the vessel. The Luckenback was on fire; a shell 
having set aflame her cargo of cotton; certain parts of the 
machinery had been damaged, but, in the main, the vessel 
was intact. The submarine was always heroic enough when 
it came to shelling defenceless merchantmen, but the ap- 
pearance of a destroyer anywhere in her neighborhood made 
her resort to the one secure road to safety — diving for pro- 
tection. The Nicholson immediately trained her guns on the 
U-boat, which, on the second shot, disappeared under the 
water. The destroyer despatched men to the disabled 
vessel, the fire was extinguished, necessary repairs to the 
machinery were made, and in a few hours the Luckenback had 
become a member of the convoy. 



I50 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Hardly had she joined the merchant ships and hardly had 
the Nicholson taken up her station on the flank when an event 
still more exciting took place. It was now late in the 
afternoon; the sea had quieted down; the whole atmosphere 
was one of peace; and there was not the slightest sign or 
suggestion of a hostile ship. The Orama, the British war- 
ship which had accompanied the convoy from its home port 
as ocean escort, had taken up her position as leading ship 
in the second column. Without the slightest warning a 
terrific explosion now took place on her starboard bow. 
There was no mystery as to what had happened; indeed, 
immediately after the explosion the wake of the torpedo ap- 
peared on the surface; there was no periscope in sight, yet it 
was clear, from the position of the wake, that the submarine 
had crept up to the side of the convoy and delivered its 
missile at close range. There was no confusion in the con- 
voy or its escorting destroyers but there were scenes of great 
activity. Immediately after the explosion a periscope ap- 
peared a few inches out of the water, stayed there only a 
second or two, and then disappeared. Brief as was this 
exposure, the keen eyes of the lookout and several sailors of 
the Conyngham, the nearest destroyer, had detected it; it dis- 
closed the fact that the enemy was in the midst of the convoy 
itself, looking for other ships to torpedo. The Conyngham 
rang for full speed, and dashed for the location of the sub- 
marine. Her officers and men now saw more than the peri- 
scope; they saw the vessel itself. The water was very clear; 
as the Conyngham circled around the Orama her officers and 
men sighted a green, shining, cigar-shaped thing under the 
water not far from the starboard side. As she sped by, the 
destroyer dropped a depth charge almost directly on top of 
the object. After the waters had quieted down pieces of 
debris were seen floating upon the surface — boards, spars, 
and other miscellaneous wreckage, evidently scraps of the 
damaged deck of a submarine. All attempts to save the 
Orama proved fruitless: the destroyers stood by for five 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 151 

hours, taking off survivors, and making all possible efforts 
to salvage the ship, but at about ten o'clock that evening she 
disappeared under the water. In rescuing the survivors 
the seamanship displayed by the Conyngham was partic- 
ularly praiseworthy. The little vessel was skilfully placed 
alongside the Orama and some three hundred men were taken 
off without accident or casualty while the ship was sinking. 

One of the things that made the work of the destroyer 
such a thankless task was that only in the rarest cases was 
it possible to prove that she had destroyed the submarine. 
Only the actual capture of the enemy ship or some of its 
crew furnished irrefutable proof that the action had been 
successful. The appearance of oil on the surface after a 
depth charge attack was not necessarily convincing, for the 
submarine early learned the trick of pumping overboard a 
little oil after such an experience; in this way it hoped to 
persuade its pursuer that it had been sunk and thus induce 
it to abandon the chase. Even the appearance of wreckage, 
such as arose on the surface after this Conyngham attack, 
did not absolutely prove that the submarine had been de- 
stroyed. Yet, as this submarine was never heard of again, 
there is little doubt that Commander Johnson's depth charge 
performed its allotted task. The judgment of the British 
Government, which awarded him the C. M. G. for his 
achievement, may be accepted as final. The Admiralty 
citation for this decoration reads as follows : 

"At 5:50 P.M. H. M. S. Orama was torpedoed in convoy. 
Conyngham went full speed, circled bow of Orama, saw sub- 
marine between lines of convoy, passed right over it so that 
it was plainly visible and dropped depth charge. Prompt 
and correct action of Commander Johnson saved more ships 
from being torpedoed and probably destroyed the sub- 
marine." 

One of the greatest difficulties of convoy commanders, 
especially during the first months the system was in opera- 
tion, was with "slacker" merchantmen; these were vessels 



152 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

which, for various reasons, fell behind the convoy, a tempting 
bait for the submarine. At this time certain of the mer- 
chant captains manifested an incurable obstinacy; they 
affected to regard the U-boats with contempt, and insisted 
rather on taking chances instead of playing the game. In 
such cases a destroyer would often have to leave the main 
division, go back several miles, and attempt to prod the 
straggler into joining the convoy, much as a shepherd dog 
attempts to force the laggard sheep to keep within the flock. 
In some cases, when the merchantman proved particularly 
obdurate, the destroyer would slyly drop a depth charge, 
near enough to give the backward vessel a considerable shak- 
ing up without doing her any injury; usually such a shock 
caused the merchantman to start full speed ahead to rejoin 
her convoy, firmly believing that a submarine was giving 
chase. In certain instances the merchantman fell behind 
the convoy because the machinery had broken down or be- 
cause she had suffered other accidents. The submarines 
would follow for days in the track of convoys, looking for a 
straggler of this kind, just as a shark will follow a vessel 
in the hope that something will be thrown overboard; and 
for this reason one destroyer at least was often detached 
from the escorting division as a rear guard. In this connec- 
tion we must keep in mind that at no time until the armistice 
was signed was any escort force strong enough to insure 
entire safety. If we had had destroyers enough to put a close 
screen, or even a double screen, around every convoy, there 
would have been almost no danger from submarines. The 
fact that all escort forces were very inadequate placed a very 
heavy responsibility upon the escort commanders, and made 
them think twice before detaching a destroyer in order to 
protect stragglers. 

One late summer afternoon the American converted yacht 
Christabel was performing this duty for the British merchant- 
m.an Danae, a vessel which had fallen eight miles behind her 
convoy, bound from La Pallice, France, to Brest. It was a 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 153 

beautiful evening; the weather was dear, the sea smooth, 
and there was not a breath of wind. Under such conditions 
a submarine could conceal its presence only with great dif- 
ficulty; and at about 5:30 the lookout on the Christabel 
detected a wake, some six hundred yards on the port quarter. 
The Christabel started at full speed; the wake suddenly 
ceased, but a few splotches of oil were seen, and she was 
steered in the direction of this disturbance A depth charge 
was dropped at the spot where the submarme ought to have 
been, but it evidently did not produce the slightest result. 
The Christabel rejoined the Danae, and the two went along 
peacefully for nearly four hours, when suddenly a periscope 
appeared about two hundred yards away, on the starboard 
side. Evidently this persistent German had been following 
the ships all that time, looking for a favorable opportunity 
to discharge his torpedo. That moment had now arrived; 
the submarine was at a distance where a carefully aimed 
shot meant certain destruction; the appearance of the peri- 
scope meant that the submarine was making observations 
in anticipation of delivering this shot. The Christabel 
started full speed for the wake of the periscope; this periscope 
itself disappeared under the water hke a guilty thing, and a 
disturbance on the surface showed that the submarine was 
making frantic efforts to submerge. The destroyer dropped 
its depth charge, set to explode at seventy feet, its radio 
meantime sending signals broadcast for assistance. Im- 
mediately after the mushroom of water arose from this charge 
a secondary explosion was heard; this was a horrible and 
muffled sound coming from the deep, more powerful and 
more terrible than any that could have been caused by the 
destroyer's "ash can." An enormous volcano of water and 
all kinds of debris arose from the sea, half way between the 
Christabel and the spot where it had dropped its charge. This 
secondary explosion shook the Christabel so violently that 
the officers thought at first that the ship had been seriously 
damaged, and a couple of men were knocked sprawling on 



154 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the deck. As soon as the water subsided great masses of 
heavy black oil began rising to the surface, and completely 
splintered wood and other wreckage appeared. In a few 
minutes the sea, for a space many hundred yards in diameter, 
was covered with dead fish — about ten times as many, the 
officers reported, as could have been killed by the usual 
depth charge. The Christabel and the ship she was guarding 
started to rejoin the main convoy, entirely satisfied with the 
afternoon's work. Indeed, they had good reason to be; a 
day or two afterward a battered submarine, the U C-^6, 
crept painfully into the harbor of Santander, Spain; it was 
the boat which had had such an exciting contest with the 
Christabel. She was injured beyond the possibility of repair; 
besides, the Spanish Government interned her for "the dura- 
tion of the war"; so that for all practical purposes the 
vessel was as good as sunk. 

V 

DISCOURAGING as was this business of hunting an 
invisible foe, events occasionally happened with all 
the unexpectedness of real drama. For the greater part of 
the time the destroyers were engaged in battle with oil 
slicks, wakes, tide rips, streaks of suds, and suspicious dis- 
turbances on the water; yet now and then there were en- 
gagements with actual boats and flesh and blood human 
beings. To spend weeks at sea with no foe more substantial 
than an occasional foamy excrescence on the surface was the 
fate of most sailormen in this war; yet a few exciting mo- 
ments, when they finally came, more than compensated for 
long periods of monotony. 

One afternoon in November, 191 7, an American destroyer 
division, commanded by Commander Frank Berrien, with 
the Nicholson as its flagship, put out of Queenstown on the 
usual mission of taking a westbound convoy to its rendezvous 
and bringing in one that was bound for British ports. This 
outward convoy was the "O Q 20" and consisted of eight fine 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 155 

ships. After the usual preliminary scoutings the vessels 
passed through the net in single file, sailed about ten miles 
to sea, and began to take up the stipulated form.ation, four 
columns of two ships each. The destroyers were moving 
around; they were even mingling in the convoy, carrying 
.nessages and giving instructions; by a quarter past four all 
the ships had attained their assigned positions, except one, 
the Rene, which was closing up to its place as the rear ship 
of the first column. Meanwhile, the destroyer Fanning was 
steaming rapidly to its post on the rear flank. Suddenly 
there came a cry from the bridge of the Fanning, where Cox- 
swain David D. Loomis was on lookout : 

"Periscope!" 

Off the starboard side of the Fanning, glistening in the 
smooth water, a periscope of the "finger" variety, one so 
small that it could usually elude all but the sharpest eyes, 
had darted for a few seconds above the surface and had then 
just as suddenly disappeared. Almost directly ahead lay the 
Welshman, a splendid British merchant ship; the periscope 
was so close that a torpedo would almost inevitably have 
hit this vessel in the engine-room. The haste with which 
the German had withdrawn his periscope, after taking a 
hurried glance around, was easily explained; for his lens had 
revealed not only this tempting bait, but the destroyer 
Fanning close aboard and bearing down on him. Under these 
circumstances it was not surprising that no torpedo was 
fired; it was clearly military wisdom to beat a quick retreat 
rather than attempt to attack the merchantman. Lieut. 
Walter S. Henry, who was the officer of the deck, acted with 
the most commendable despatch. It is not the simplest 
thing, even when the submarine is so obviously located as 
this one apparently was, to reach the spot accurately. 

The destroyer has to make a wide and rapid turn, and there 
is every danger, in making this manoeuvre, that the location 
will be missed. Subsequent events disclosed that the Fan- 
ning was turned with the utmost accuracy. As the ship 



156 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

darted by the spot at which the periscope had been sighted, 
a depth charge went over the stern, and exploded so violently 
that the main generator of the Fanning herself was tempo- 
rarily disabled. Meanwhile, the Nicholson had dashed 
through the convoy, made a rapid detour to the left, and 
dropped another depth charge a short distance ahead of 
the Fanning. 

The disturbances made on the water by these "ash cans" 
gradually subsided; to all outward appearances the sub- 
marine had escaped unharmed. The Fanning and the 
Nicholson completed their circles and came back to the danger 
spot, the officers and crew eagerly scanning the surface for 
the usual oil patch and air bubbles, even hoping for a few 
pieces of wreckage — those splintered remnants of the sub- 
marine's wooden deck that almost invariably indicated a 
considerable amount of damage. But none of these evidences 
of success, or half-success, rose to the surface; for ten or 
fifteen minutes everything was as quiet as the grave. Then 
something happened which occurred only a few times in 
this strange war. The stern of a submarine appeared out 
of the water, tilted at about thirty degrees, clearly revealing 
its ugly torpedo tubes. Then came the conning tower and 
finally the entire boat, the whole hull taking its usual posi- 
tion on the surface as neatly and unconcernedly as though 
no enemies were near. So far as could be seen the U-boat 
was in perfect condition. Its hull looked intact, showing 
not the slightest indication of injury; the astonished officers 
and men on the destroyers could easily understand now 
why no oil or wreckage had risen to the top, for the U-$8 — 
they could now see this inscription plainly painted on the 
conning tower — was not leaking, and the deck showed no 
signs of having come into contact even remotely with a depth 
charge. The Fanning and the Nicholson began firing shells 
at the unexpected visitant, and the Nicholson extended an 
additional welcome in the form of a hastily dropped "ash 
can." 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 157 

Suddenly the conning tower of the submarine opened and 
out popped the rotund face and well-fed form of Kapitan- 
Leutnant Gustav Amberger, of the Imperial German Navy. 
The two arms of the Herr Kapitan immediately shot heaven- 
ward and the Americans on the destroyers could hear certain 
guttural ejaculations: 

"Kamerad! Kamerad!" 

A hatchway now opened, and a procession of German 
sailors emerged, one after the other, into the sunshine, like 
ants crawling out of their hole. As each sailor reached the 
deck he straightened up, lifted his arms, and shouted : 

"Kamerad! Kamerad! Kamerad!" 

In all four officers and thirty-five men went through this 
ceremony. Were they really surrendering themselves and 
their boat, or did these gymnastic exercises conceal some new 
form of German craftiness? The American ships ceased 
firing; the Fanning gingerly approached the submarine, 
while the Nicholson stood by, all her 4-inch guns trained 
upon the German boat, and the machine guns pointed 
at the kamerading Germans, ready to shoot them into rib- 
bons at the first sign that the surrender was not a genuine 
one. 

While these preliminaries were taking place, a couple of 
German sailors disappeared into the interior of the sub- 
marine, stayed there a moment or two, and then returned to 
the deck. They had apparently performed a duty that was 
characteristically German; for a few minutes after they 
appeared again, the U-^8 began to settle in the water, and 
soon afterward sank. These men, obeying orders, had 
opened the cocks and scuttled the ship — this after the officers 
had surrendered her! As the submarine disappeared, the 
men and officers dove and started swimming toward the 
Fanning; four of them became entangled in the radio anten- 
nae and were dragged under the waves; however, in a few 
minutes these men succeeded in disentangling themselves 
and joined the swimmers. As the thirty-nine men neared 



158 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the Fanning it was evident that most of them were ex- 
tremely wearied and that some were almost exhausted. The 
sailors from the Fanning threw over lines; some still had the 
strength to climb up these to the deck, while to others it was 
necessary to throw other lines which they could adjust under 
their arms. These latter, limp and wet figures, the Ameri- 
can sailors pulled up, much as the fisherman pulls up the 
inert body of a monster fish. And now an incident took 
place which reveals that the American navy has rather 
different ideals of humanity from the German. One of the 
sailors was so exhausted that he could not adjust the life 
lines around his shoulders; he was very apparently drowning. 
Like a flash Elxer Harwell, chief pharmacist mate, and 
Francis G. Conner, coxswain, jumped overboard, swam to 
this floundering German, and adjusted the Hne around him 
as solicitously as though he had been a shipmate. The poor 
wretch — his name was Franz Glinder — was pulled aboard, 
but he was so far gone that all attempts to resuscitate him 
failed and he died on the deck of the Fanning. 

Kapitan Amberger, wet and dripping, immediately walked 
up to Lieut. A. S. Carpender, the commander of the Fan- 
ning, clicked his heels together, saluted in the most ceri- 
monious German fashion, and surrendered himself, his offi- 
cers, and his crew. He also gave his parole for his men. Tho 
officers were put in separate staterooms under guard and 
each of the crew was placed under the protection of a well- 
armed American jackie — who, it may be assumed, im- 
mensely enjoyed this new duty. All the "survivors" were 
dressed in dry, warm clothes, and good food and drink were 
given them. They were even supplied with cigarettes and 
something which they valued more than all the delicacies 
in the world — soap for a washing, the first soap which they 
had had in months, for this was an article which was more 
scarce in Germany than even copper or rubber. Our physi- 
cians gave the men first aid, and others attended to all their 
minor wants. Evidently the fact that they had been cap- 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 159 

tured did not greatly depress their spirits, for, after eating 
and drinking to their heart's content, the assembled Ger- 
mans burst into song. 

But what was the explanation of this strange proceeding? 
The German oificers, at first rather stiff and sullen, ultimately 
unbent enough to tell their story. Their submarine had 
been hanging off the entrance to Queenstown for nearly two 
days, waiting for this particular convoy to emerge. The 
officers admitted that they were getting ready to torpedo 
the Welshman when the discovery that the Fanning was only 
a short distance away compelled a sudden change in their 
plans. Few "ash cans" dropped in the course of the war 
reached their objective with the unerring accuracy of the 
one which now came from this American destroyer. It did 
not crush the submarine but the concussion wrecked the 
motors, making it impossible for it to navigate, jammed its 
diving rudders, making the boat uncontrollable under the 
water, and broke the oil leads, practically shutting off the 
supply of this indispensable fuel. Indeed, it would be im- 
possible to conceive of a submarine in a more helpless and 
unmanageable state. The officers had the option of two 
alternatives : to sink until the pressure of the water crushed 
the boat like so much paper, or to blow the ballast tanks, 
rise to the surface, and surrender. Even while the Com- 
mander was mentally debating this problem, the submarine 
was rapidly descending to the bottom; when it reached a 
depth of two hundred feet, which was about all that it could 
stand, the commander decided to take his chances with the 
Americans. Rising to the top involved great dangers; but 
the guns of the destroyers seemed less formidable to these 
cornered Germans than the certainty of the horrible death 
that awaited them under the waves. 

Admiral Bayly came to meet the Fanning as she sailed 
into Queenstown with her unexpected cargo. He went on 
board the destroyer to congratulate personally the officers 
and men upon their achievement. He published to the 



i6o THE VICTORY AT SEA 

assembled company a cablegram just received from the 
Admiralty in London : 

Express to commanding officers and men of the United States 
ship Fanning their Lordships' high appreciation of their successful 
action against enemy submarine. 

1 added a telegram of my own, ending up with the words, 
which seemed to amuse the officers and men: "Go out and do 
it again." 

For this action the commanding officer of the Fanning, 
Lieutenant-Commander Carpender, was recommended by 
the Admiralty for the D. S. O., which was subsequently con- 
ferred upon him by the King at Buckingham Palace. 

Only one duty remained : the commanding officer read the 
burial service over the body of poor Franz Glinder, the 
German sailor who had been drowned in his attempt to 
swim to the Fanning. The Fanning then steamed out to sea 
with the body and buried it with all the honors of war. A 
letter subsequently written by Kapitan Amberger to a friend 
in Germany summed up his opinion of the situation in these 
words : 

"The Americans were much nicer and more obliging than 
expected." 

VI 

SO FAR as convoying merchant ships was concerned 
Queenstown was the largest American base; by the 
time the movement of troops laid heavy burdens on the 
American destroyers Brest became a headquarters almost 
equally important. 

In July, 191 7, the British Government requested the 
cooperation of the American navy in the great work which 
it had undertaken at Gibraltar; and on August 6th the 
U. S. S. Sacramento reached that port, followed about a week 
afterward by the Birmingham flying the flag of Rear- 
Admiral Henrv B. Wilson. Admiral Wilson remained as 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION i6i 

commander of this force until November, when he left to 
assume the direction of affairs at Brest. On November 
25th Rear-Admiral Albert P. Niblack succeeded to this 
command, which he retained throughout the war. 

Gibraltar was the "gateway" for more traffic than any- 
other port in the world. It was estimated that more than 
one quarter of all the convoys which reached the Entente 
nations either rendezvoused at this point or passed through 
these straits. This was the great route to the East by way 
of the Suez Canal. From Gibraltar extended the Allied 
lines of communication to southern France, Italy, Saloniki, 
Egypt, Palestine, and Mesopotamia. There were other 
routes to Bizerta (Tunis), Algiers, the island of Milo, and a 
monthly service to the Azores. 

The Allied forces that were detailed to protect this ship- 
ping were chiefly British and American, though they were 
materially assisted by French, Japanese, and Italian vessels. 
They consisted of almost anything which the hard-pressed 
navies could assemble from all parts of the world — anti- 
quated destroyers, yachts, sloops, trawlers, drifters, and the 
like. The Gibraltar area was a long distance from the 
main enemy submarine bases. The enemy could maintain 
at sea at any one time only a relatively small number of 
submarines; inasmuch as the zone off the English Channel 
and Ireland was the most critical one, the Allies stationed 
their main destroyer force there. Because of these facts, 
we had great difficulty in finding vessels to protect the 
important Gibraltar area, and the force which we ultimately 
got together was therefore a miscellaneous lot. The United 
States gathered at this point forty-one ships, and a per- 
sonnel which averaged 314 officers and 4,660 men. This 
American aggregation contained a variegated assortment of 
scout cruisers, gunboats, coast guard cutters, yachts, and 
five destroyers of antique type. The straits to which we 
were reduced for available vessels for the Gibraltar station — 
and the British navy was similarly hard pressed — were 



i62 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

illustrated by the fact that we placed these destroyers at 
Gibraltar. They were the Decatur and four similar vessels, 
each of 420 tons — the modern destroyer is a vessel of from 
1,000 to 1,200 tons — and were stationed, when the war 
broke out, at Manila, where they were considered fit only 
for local service, yet the record which these doughty little 
ships made is characteristic of the spirit of our young officers. 
This little squadron steamed 12,000 miles from Manila to 
Gibraltar, and that they arrived in condition immediately 
to take up their duties was due to the excellent judgment and 
seamanship displayed by their commanding officer, Lieu- 
tenant-Commander (now Commander) Harold R. Stark. 
Subsequently they made 48,000 miles on escort duty. This 
makes 60,000 miles for vessels which in peace times had been 
consigned to minor duties! Unfortunately one of these 
gallant little vessels was subsequently cut down and sunk by 
a merchant ship while escorting a convoy. 

For more than a year the Gibraltar force under Admiral 
Niblack performed service which reflected high credit upon 
that commander, his officers, and his men. During this 
period of time it escorted, in cooperation with the British 
forces, 562 convoys, comprising a total of 10,478 ships. Be- 
sides protecting commerce, chasing submarines, and keeping 
them under the surface, many of the vessels making up this 
squadron had engagements with submarines that were classi- 
fied as "successful." On May 15, 19 18, the Wheeling, a 
gunboat, and the Surveyor and Venetia, yachts, while escort- 
ing a Mediterranean convoy, depth charged a submarine 
which had just torpedoed one of the convoyed vessels; we 
credited these little ships with sinking their enemy. The 
Venetia, under the command of Commander L. B. Porter- 
field, U. S. N., had an experience not unhke that of the 
Christohel, already described. On this occasion she was part 
of the escort of a Gibraltar-Bizerta convoy. A British mem- 
ber of this convoy, the Surveyor, was torpedoed at six in the 
evening; at that time the submarine gave no further evidence 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 163 

of its existence. The Venetia, however, was detailed to re- 
main in the neighborhood, attempt to locate the mysterious 
vessel, and at least to keep it under the water. The Venetia 
soon found the wake of the submerged enemy and dropped 
the usual depth charges. Three days afterward a badly in- 
jured U-boat put in at Carthagena, Spain, and was interned 
for the rest of the war. Thus another submarine was as good 
as sunk. The Lydonia, a yacht of 500 tons, in conjunction 
with the British ship Basilisk, sank another U-boat in the 
western Mediterranean. This experience illustrates the 
doubt that enshrouded all such operations, for it was not 
until three months after the Lydonia engagement took place 
that the Admiralty discovered that the submarine had been 
destroyed and recommended Commander Richard P. 
McCullough, U.S.N., for a decoration. 

Thus from the first day that this method of convoying 
ships was adopted it was an unqualified success in defeating 
the submarine campaign. By August i, 19 17, more than 
10,000 ships had been convoyed, with losses of only one half 
of I per cent. Up to that same date not a single ship which 
had left North American ports in convoy had been lost. 
By August nth, 261 ships had been sent in convoy from 
North American ports, and of these only one had fallen a prey 
to the submarines. The convoy gave few opportunities for 
encounters with their enemies. I have already said that 
the great value of this system as a protection to shipping was 
that it compelled the under-water boats to fight their deadliest 
enemies, the destroyers, every time they tried to sink mer- 
chant ships in convoy, and they did not attempt this often 
on account of the danger. There were destroyer command- 
ers who spent months upon the open sea, convoying huge 
aggregations of cargo vessels, without even once seeing a 
submarine. To a great extent the convoy system did its 
work in the same way that the Grand Fleet performed its 
indispensable service — silently, unobtrusively, making no 
dramatic bids for popular favor, and industriously plodding 



i64 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

on, day after day and month after month. All this time the 
world had its eyes fixed upon the stirring events of the West- 
ern Front, almost unconscious of the existence of the forces 
that made those land operations possible. Yet a few statis- 
tics eloquently disclose the part played by the convoy system 
in winning the war. In the latter months of the struggle 
from 91 to 92 per cent, of Allied shipping sailed in convoys. 
The losses in these convoys were less than i per cent. And 
this figure includes the ships lost after the dispersal of the 
convoys; in convoys actually under destroyer escort the losses 
were less than one half of i per cent. Military experts would 
term the convoy system a defensive-offensive measure. By 
this they mean that it was a method of taking a defensive 
position in order to force the enemy to meet you and give you 
an opportunity for the offensive. It is an old saying that the 
best defensive measure is a vigorous offensive one. Unfor- 
tunately, owing to the fact that the Allies had not prepared 
for the kind of warfare which the Germans saw fit to employ 
against them, we could not conduct purely offensive opera- 
tions; that is, we could not employ our anti-submarine forces 
exclusively in the effort to destroy the submarines. Up to 
the time of the armistice, despite all the^ assistance rendered 
to the navies by the best scientific brains of the world, no sure 
means had been found of keeping track of the submarine 
once he submerged. The convoy system was, therefore, 
our only method of bringing him into action. I lay stress 
on this point and reiterate it because many critics kept in- 
sisting during the war — and their voices are still heard — that 
the convoy system was purely a defensive or passive method 
of opposing the submarine, and was, therefore, not sound 
tactics. It is quite true that we had to defend our shipping 
in order to win the war, but it is wrong to assume that the 
method adopted to accomplish this protection was a purely 
defensive and passive one. 

As my main purpose is to describe the work of the Ameri- 
can navy I have said little in the above about the activities 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 165 

of the British navy in convoying merchant ships. But we 
should not leave this subject with a false perspective. When 
the war ended we had seventy-nine destroyers in European 
waters, while Great Britain had about 400. These included 
those assigned to the Grand Fleet, to the Harwich force, to 
the Dover patrol, to Gibraltar and the Mediterranean, and 
other places, many of which were but incidentally making 
war on the submarines. As to minor ships — trawlers, sloops, 
Q-boats, yachts, drifters, tugs, and the other miscellaneous 
types used in this work — the discrepancy was even greater. 
In absolute figures our effort thus seems a small one when 
compared with that of our great ally. In tonnage of mer- 
chant ships convoyed, the work of the British navy was far 
greater than ours. Yet the help which we contributed was 
indispensable to the success that was attained. For, judging 
from the situation before we entered the war, and knowing the 
inadequacy of the total Allied anti-submarine forces even 
after we had entered, it seems hardly possible that, without 
the assistance of the United States Navy, the vital lines of 
communication of the armies in the field could have been 
kept open, the civil populations of Great Britain supplied 
with food, and men and war materials sent from America to 
the Western Front. In other words, I think I am justified 
in saying that without the cooperation of the American 
navy the Allies could not have won the war. Our forces 
stationed at Queenstown actually escorted through the dan- 
ger zone about 40 per cent, of all the cargoes which left North 
American ports. When 1 describe the movement of Ameri- 
can troops, it will appear that our destroyers located at 
Queenstown and Brest did even a larger share of this work. 
The latest reports show that about 205 German submarines 
were destroyed. Of these it seems probable that thirteen 
can be credited to American efforts, the rest to Great Britain, 
France, and Italy — the greatest number, of course, to Great 
Britain. When we take into consideration the few ships 
that we had on the other side, compared with those of the 



i66 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Allies, and the comparatively brief period in which we were 
engaged in the war, this must be regarded as a highly credit- 
able showing. 

I regret that I have not been able to describe the work of 
all of our officers and men; to do this, however, would demand 
more than a single volume. One of the disappointing aspects 
of destroyer work was that many of the finest perform- 
ances were those that were the least spectacular. The fact 
that an attack upon a submarine did not result in a sinking 
hardly robbed it of its importance; many of the finest exploits 
of our forces did not destroy the enemy, but they will always 
hold a place in our naval annals for the daring and skill with 
which they were conducted. In this class belong the achieve- 
ments of the Sterrett, under Lieutenant-Commander Farqu- 
har; of the Benham, under Lieutenant-Commander D. Lyons; 
of the O'Brien, under Lieutenant-Commander C. A. Blakeley ; 
of the Parker, under Lieutenant-Commander H. Powell; of 
the Jacob Jones, under Lieutenant-Commander D. W. 
Bagley; of the Wadsworth, under Commander Taussig, and 
afterward I. F. Dortch; of the Drayton, under Lieutenant- 
Commander D. L. Howard; of the McDougal, under Lieu- 
tenant-Commander A. P. Fairfield; and of the Nicholson, 
under Commander F. D. Berrien. The senior destroyer 
commander at Queenstown was Commander David C. Han- 
rahan of the Gushing, a fine character and one of the most 
experienced officers of his rank in the Navy. He was a tower 
of strength at all times, and I shall have occasion to mention 
him later in connection with certain important duties. The 
Chief -of-Staff at Queenstown, Captain J. R. P. Pringle, was 
especially commended by Admiral Bayly for his "tact, 
energy, and ability." The American naval forces at Queens- 
town were under my immediate command. Necessarily, 
however, I had to spend the greater part of my time at the 
London headquarters, or at the Naval Council in Paris, and 
it was therefore necessary that I should be represented at 
Queenstown by a man of marked ability. Captain Pringle 



AMERICAN DESTROYERS IN ACTION 167 

proved equal to every emergency. He was responsible for 
the administration, supplies, and maintenance of the Queens- 
town forces, and the state of readiness and efficiency in which 
they were constantly maintained was the strongest possible 
evidence of his ability. To him was chiefly due also the fact 
that our men cooperated so harmoniously and successfully 
with the British. 

As an example of the impression which our work made I 
can do no better than to quote the message sent by Admiral 
Sir Lewis Bayly to the Queenstown forces on May 4, 1918: 

"On the anniversary of the arrival of the first United States 
men-of-war at Queenstown, I wish to express my deep grati- 
tude to the United States officers and ratings for the skill, 
energy, and unfailing good-nature which they have all con- 
sistently shown and which qualities have so materially as- 
sisted in the war by enabling ships of the Allied Powers to 
cross the ocean in comparative freedom. 

"To command you is an honour, to work with you is a 
pleasure, to know you is to know the best traits of the Anglo- 
Saxon race." 



CHAPTER V 

DECOYING SUBMARINES TO 
DESTRUCTION 

I 

MY CHIEF purpose in writing this book is to de- 
scribe the activities during the World War of the 
United States naval forces operating in Europe. 
Yet it is my intention also to make clear the sev- 
eral ways in which the war against the submarine was won; 
and in order to do this it will be necessary occasionally to 
depart from the main subject and to describe certain naval 
operations of our allies. The most important agency in 
frustrating the submarine was the convoy system. An ex- 
amination of the tonnage losses in 191 7 and in 19 18, however, 
discloses that this did not entirely prevent the loss of mer- 
chant ships. From April, 191 7, to November, 1918, the 
monthly losses dropped from 875,000 to 101,168 tons. This 
decrease in sinkings enabled the Allies to preserve their 
communications and so win the war; however, it is evident 
that these losses, while not necessarily fatal to the Allied 
cause, still offered a serious impediment to success. It was 
therefore necessary to supplement the convoy system in all 
possible ways. Every submarine that could be destroyed, 
whatever the method of destruction, represented just that 
much gain to the Allied cause. Every submarine that was 
sent to the bottom amounted in 19 17 to a saving of many 
thousands of tons per year of merchant shipping that would 
have been sunk by the U-boat if left unhindered to pursue 
its course. Besides escorting merchant ships, therefore, the 
Allied navies developed several methods of hunting individual 

]68 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 169 

submarines; and these methods not only sank a considerable 
number of U-boats, but played an important part in breaking 
down the German submarine morale. For the greater part 
of the war the utmost secrecy was observed regarding these 
expedients; it was not until the early part of 19 18, indeed, 
that the public heard anything of the special service vessels 
that came to be known as the "mystery" or "Q-ships" — 
although these had been operating for nearly three years. 
It is true that the pubHc knew that there was something in 
the wind, for there were announcements that certain naval 
officers had received the Victoria Cross, but as there was no 
citation explaining why these coveted rewards were given, 
they were known as "mystery V. C.'s." 

On one of my visits to Queenstown Admiral Bayly showed 
me a wireless message which he had recently received from 
the commanding officer of a certain mystery ship operating 
from Queenstown, one of the most successful of these vessels. 
It was brief but sufficiently eloquent. 
"Am slowly sinking," it read. "Good-bye, I did my best." 
Though the man who had sent that message was appar- 
ently facing death at the time when it was written, Admiral 
Bayly told me that he had survived the ordeal, and that, in 
fact, he would dine at Admiralty House that very night. 
Another fact about this man lifted him above the common- 
place: he was the first Q-boat commander to receive the 
Victoria Cross, and one of the very few who wore both the 
Victoria Cross and the Distinguished Service Order; and 
he subsequently won bars for each, not to mention the Croix 
de Guerre and the Legion of Honor. When Captain Gor- 
don Campbell arrived, I found that he was a Britisher of 
quite the accepted type. His appearance suggested nothing 
extraordinary. He was a short, rather thick-set, phlegmatic 
Englishman, somewhat non-committal in his bearing; until 
he knew a man well, his conversation consisted of a few 
monosyllables, and even on closer acquaintance his stolidity 
and reticence, especially in the matter of his own exploits, 



lyo THE VICTORY AT SEA 

did not entirely disappear. Yet there was something about 
the Captain which suggested the traits that had already made 
it possible for him to sink three submarines, and which after- 
ward added other trophies to his record. It needed no elabo- 
rate story of his performances to inform me that Captain 
Campbell was about as cool and determined a man as was to 
be found in the British navy. His associates declared that 
his physical system absolutely lacked nerves; that, when 
it came to pursuing a German submarine, his patience and 
his persistence knew no bounds; and that the extent to which 
his mind concentrated upon the task in hand amounted to 
little less than genius. When the war began, Captain Camp- 
bell, then about thirty years old, was merely one of several 
thousand junior officers in the British navy. He had not 
distinguished himself in any way above his associates, and 
probably none of his superiors had ever regarded him as in 
any sense an unusual man. Had the naval war taken the 
course of most naval wars, Campbell would probably have 
served well, but perhaps not brilliantly. This conflict, how- 
ever, demanded a new type of warfare and at the same time 
it demanded a new type of naval fighter. To go hunting 
for the submarine required not only courage of a high order, 
but analytical intelligence, patience, and a talent for prepara- 
tion and detail. Captain Campbell seemed to have been 
created for this particular task. That evening at Queens- 
town he finally gave way to much urging, and entertained 
us for hours with his adventures; he told the stories of his 
battles with submarines so quietly, so simply and, indeed, so 
impersonally, that at first they impressed his hearers as not 
particularly unusual. Yet, after the recital was finished, 
we realized that the mystery ship performances represented 
some of the most admirable achievements in the whole his- 
tory of naval warfare. We have laid great emphasis upon the 
brutalizing aspects of the European War; it is well, therefore, 
that we do not forget that it had its more exalted phases. 
Human nature may at times have manifested itself in its 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 171 

most cowardly traits, but it also reached a level of courage 
which, I am confident, it has seldom attained in any other 
conflict. It was reserved for this devastating struggle to 
teach us how brave modern men could really be. And when 
the record is complete it seems unlikely that it will furnish 
any finer illustration of the heroic than that presented by 
Captain Campbell and his compatriots of the mystery 
ships. 

This type of vessel was a regular ship of His Majesty's 
navy, yet there was little about it that suggested warfare. 
To the outward eye it was merely one of those several thou- 
sand freighters or tramps which, in normal times, sailed 
sluggishly from port to port, carrying the larger part of the 
world's commerce. It looked like a particularly dirty and 
uninviting specimen of the breed. Just who invented this 
grimy enemy of the submarine is unknown, as are the in- 
ventors of many other devices developed by the war. It 
was, however, the natural outcome of a close study of German 
naval methods. The man who first had the idea well under- 
stood the peculiar mentality of the U-boat commanders. 
The Germans had a fairly easy time in the early days of sub- 
marine warfare on merchant shipping. They sank as many 
ships as possible with gunfire and bombs. The prevailing 
method then was to break surface, and begin shelling the 
defenceless enemy. In case the merchant ship was faster 
than the submarine she would take to her heels; if, as was 
usually the case, she was slower, the passengers and crews 
lowered the boats and left the vessel to her fate. In such 
instances the procedure of the submarine was invariably the 
same. It ceased shelling, approached the lifeboats filled 
with survivors, and ordered them to take a party of Germans 
to the ship. This party then searched the vessel for all kinds 
of valuables, and, after depositing time bombs in the hold, 
rowed back to the submarine. This procedure was popular 
with the Germans, because it was the least expensive form of 
destroying merchant ships. It was not necessary to use 



172 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

torpedoes or even a large number of shells; an inexpensive 
bomb, properly placed, did the whole job. Even when the 
arming of merchant ships interfered with this simple pro- 
gramme, and compelled the Germans to use long-range gun- 
fire or torpedoes, the submarine commanders still persisted 
in rising to the surface near the sinking ship. Torpedoes 
were so expensive that the German Admiralty insisted on 
having every one accounted for. The word of the com- 
mander that he had destroyed a merchant ship was not ac- 
cepted at its face value; in order to have the exploit officially 
placed to his credit, and so qualify the commander and crew 
for the rewards that came to the successful, it was necessary 
to prove that the ship had actually gone to the bottom. A 
prisoner or two furnished unimpeachable evidence, and, in 
default of such trophies, the ship's papers would be accepted. 
In order to obtain such proofs of success the submarine had 
to rise to the surface and approach its victim. The search 
for food, especially for alcoholic liquor, was another motive 
that led to such a manoeuvre; and sometimes mere curiosity, 
the desire to come to close quarters and inspect the conse- 
quences of his handiwork, also impelled the Hun commander 
to take what was, as events soon demonstrated, a particularly 
hazardous risk. 

This simple fact that the submarine, even when the danger 
had been realized, insisted on rising to the surface and ap- 
proaching the vessel which it had torpedoed, offered the Allies 
an opportunity which they were not slow in seizing. There 
is hardly anything in warfare which is more vulnerable than 
a submarine on the surface within a few hundred yards of 
a 4-inch gun. A single, well-aimed shot will frequently 
send it to the bottom. Indeed, a U-boat caught in such a 
predicament has only one chance of escaping: that is repre- 
sented by the number of seconds which it takes to get under 
the water. But before that time has expired rapidly firing 
guns can put a dozen shots into its hull; with modern, well- 
trained gun crews, therefore, a submarine which exposes it- 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 173 

self in this way stands practically no chance of getting away. 
Clearly, the obvious thing for the Allies to do was to send 
merchant ships, armed with hidden guns, along the great 
highways of commerce. The crews of these ships should be 
naval officers and men disguised as merchant masters and 
sailors. They should duplicate in all details the manners 
and the "technique" of a freighter's crew, and, when shelled 
or torpedoed by a submarine, they should behave precisely 
like the passengers and crews of merchantmen in such a crisis; 
a part — the only part visible to the submarine — should leave 
the vessel in boats, while the remainder should lie concealed 
until the submarine rose to the surface and approached the 
vessel. When the enemy had come within two or three hun- 
dred yards, the bulwarks should fall down, disclosing the 
armament, the white battle ensign go up, and the guns open 
fire on the practically helpless enemy. 

II 



SUCH was the mystery ship idea in its simplest form. 
In the early days it worked according to this pro- 
gramme. Thetrustful submarinecommanderwhoapproached 
a mystery ship in the manner which I have described 
promptly found his resting place on the bottom of the 
sea. I have frequently wondered what must have been the 
emotions of this first submarine crew, when, standing on the 
deck of their boat, steaming confidently toward their victim, 
they saw its bulwarks suddenly drop, and beheld the ship, 
which to all outward appearances was a helpless, foundering 
hulk, become a mass of belching fire and smoke and shot. 
The picture of that first submarine, standing upright in the 
water, reeling like a drunken man, while the apparently inno- 
cent merchant ship kept pouring volley after volley into its 
sides, is one that will not quickly fade from the memory of 
British naval men. Yet it is evident that the Allies could 
not play a game Hke this indefinitely. They could do so 
just as long as the Germans insisted on delivering themselves 



174 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

into their hands. The complete success of the idea depended 
at first upon the fact that the very existence of mystery ships 
was unknown to the German navy. All that the Germans 
knew, in these early days, was that certain U-boats had sailed 
from Germany and had not returned. But it was inevitable 
that the time should come when a mystery ship attack would 
fail; the German submarine would return and report that 
this new terror of the seas was at large. And that is precisely 
what happened. A certain submarine received a battering 
which it seemed hardly likely that any U-boat could survive; 
yet, almost by a miracle, it crept back to its German base 
and reported the manner of its undoing. Clearly the mys- 
tery ships in future were not to have as plain sailing as in the 
past ; the game, if it were to continue, would become more a 
battle of wits; henceforth every liner and merchantman, in 
German eyes, was a possible enemy in disguise, and it was 
to be expected that the U-boat commanders would resort to 
every means of protecting their craft against them. That 
the Germans knew all about these vessels became apparent 
when one of their naval publications fell into our hands, giv- 
ing complete descriptions and containing directions to U-boat 
commanders how to meet this new menace. The German 
newspapers and illustrated magazines also began to devote 
much space to this kind of anti-submarine fighting, denounc- 
ing it in true Germanic fashion as "barbarous" and contrary 
to the rules of civilized warfare. The great significance of 
this knowledge is at once apparent. The mere fact that a 
number of Q-ships were at sea, even if they did not succeed 
in sinking many submarines, forced the Germans to make a 
radical change in their submarine tactics. As they could no 
longer bring to, board, and loot merchant ships, and sink 
them inexpensively and without danger by the use of bombs, 
they were obliged not only to use their precious torpedoes, 
but also to torpedo without warning. This was the only 
alternative except to abandon the submarine campaign al- 
together. 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 175 

Berlin accordingly instructed the submarine commanders 
not to approach on the surface any merchant or passenger 
vessel closely enough to get within range of its guns, but to 
keep at a distance and shell it. Had the commanders al- 
ways observed these instructions the success of the mystery 
ship in sinking submarines would have ended then and there, 
though the influence of their presence upon tactics would 
have remained in force. The Allied navies now made 
elaborate preparations, all for the purpose of persuading 
Fritz to approach in the face of a tremendous risk concerning 
which he had been accurately informed. Every submarine 
commander, after torpedoing his victim, now clearly under- 
stood that it might be a decoy despatched for the particular 
purpose of entrapping him; and he knew that an attempt to 
approach within a short distance of the foundering vessel 
might spell his own immediate destruction. The expert in 
German mentality must explain why, under these circum- 
stances, he should have persisted in walking into the jaws of 
death. The skill with which the mystery ships and their 
crews were disguised perhaps explains this in part. Any one 
who might have happened in the open sea upon Captain 
Campbell and his slow-moving freighter could not have 
believed that they were part and parcel of the Royal Navy. 
Our own destroyers were sometimes deceived by them. The 
Gushing one day hailed Captain Campbell in the Pargust, 
having mistaken him for a defenceless tramp. The con- 
versation between the two ships was brief but to the point : 

Cushing: What ship? 

Pargust: Gordon Campbell! Please keep out of sight. 

The next morning another enemy submarine met her fate 
at the hands of Captain Campbell, and although the Cushing 
had kept far enough away not to interfere with the action, 
she had the honor of escorting the injured mystery ship into 
port and of receiving as a reward three rousing cheers from 
the crew of the Pargust led by Campbell. 



176 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

A more villainous-looking gang of seamen than the crews 
of these ships never sailed the waves. All men on board 
were naval officers or enlisted men; they were all volunteers 
and comprised men of all ranks — admirals, captains, com- 
manders, and midshipmen. All had temporarily abandoned 
His Majesty's uniform for garments picked up in second- 
hand clothing stores. They had made the somewhat dis- 
concerting discovery that carefully trained gentlemen of the 
naval forces, when dressed in cast-off clothing and when 
neglectful of their beards, differ little in appearance from the 
somewhat rough-and-tumble characters of the tramp service. 
To assume this external disguise successfully meant that the 
volunteers had also to change almost their personal char- 
acteristics as well as their clothes. Whereas the conspicuous 
traits of a naval man are neatness and order, these counter- 
feit merchant sailors had to train themselves in the casual 
ways of tramp seamen. They had also to accustom them- 
selves to the conviction that a periscope was every moment 
searching their vessel from stem to stern in an attempt to 
discover whether there was anything suspicious about it; 
they therefore had not only to dress the part of merchant- 
men, but to act it, even in its minor details. The genius of 
Captain Campbell consisted in the fact that he had made a 
minute study of merchantmen, their officers and their crews, 
and was able to reproduce them so literally on this vessel that 
even the expert eye was deceived. Necessarily such a ship 
carried a larger crew than the merchant freighter; nearly all, 
however, were kept constantly concealed, the number ap- 
pearing on deck always representing just about the same 
number as would normally have sailed upon a tramp steamer. 
These men had to train themselves in slouchiness of behavior; 
they would hang over the rails, and even use merchant terms 
in conversation with one another; the officers were "masters" 
"mates," "pursers," and the like, and their principal gather- 
ing place was not a wardroom, but .a saloon. That scrupu- 
lous deference with which a subordinate officer in the navy 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 177 

treats his superior was laid aside in this service. It was no 
longer the custom to salute before addressing the com- 
mander; more frequently the sailor would slouch up to his 
superior, his hands in his pockets and his pipe in his mouth. 
This attempt to deceive the Hun observer at the periscope 
sometimes assumed an even more ludicrous form. When the 
sailor of a warship dumps ashes overboard he does it with 
particular care, so as not to soil the sides of his immaculate 
vessel; but a merchant seaman is much less considerate: he 
usually hurls overboard anything he does not want and lets 
the ship's side take its chances. To have followed the 
manner of the navy would at once have given the game 
away; so the sailors, in carrying out this domestic duty, per- 
formed the act with all the nonchalance of merchant sea- 
men. To have messed in naval style would also have been 
betraying themselves. The ship's cook, therefore, in a white 
coat, would come on deck, and have a look around, precisely 
as he would do on a freighter. Even when in port officers and 
men maintained their disguise. They never visited hotels or 
clubs or private houses; they spent practically all their time 
on board; if they occasionally went ashore, their merchant 
outfit so disguised them that even their best friends would not 
have recognized them on the street. 

The warlike character of their ships was even more cleverly 
hidden. In the early days the guns were placed behind the 
bulwarks, which, when a lever was pulled, would fall down, 
thus giving them an unobstructed range at the submarine. 
In order to make the sides of the ships collapsible, certain 
seams were unavoidably left in the plates, where the detach- 
able part joined the main structure. The U-boat com- 
manders soon learned to look for these betraying seams 
before coming to the surface. They would sail submerged 
around the ship, the periscope minutely examining the sides, 
much as a scientist examines his specimens with a micro- 
scope. This practice made it necessary to conceal the guns 
more carefully. The places which were most serviceable for 



178 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

this purpose were the hatchways — those huge wells, extend- 
ing from the deck to the bottom, which are used for loading 
and unloading cargo. Platforms were erected in these 
openings, and on these guns were emplaced; a covering of 
tarpaulin completely hid them; yet a lever, pulled by the 
gun crews, would cause the sides of the hatchway covers to 
fall instantaneously. Other guns were placed under life- 
boats, which, by a similar mechanism, would fall apart, or 
rise in the air, exposing the gun. Perhaps the most de- 
ceptive device of all was a gun placed upon the stem, and, 
with its crew, constantly exposed to public gaze. Since 
most merchantmen carried such a gun, its absence on a 
mystery ship would in itself have caused suspicion; this 
armament not only helped the disguise, but served a use- 
ful purpose in luring the submarine. At the first glimpse 
of a U-boat on the surface, usually several miles away, 
the gun crew would begin shooting; but they always took 
care that the shots fell short, thus convincing the submarine 
that it had the advantage of range and so inducing it to 
close. 

Captain Campbell and his associates paid as much atten- 
tion to details in their ships as in their personal appearance. 
The ship's wash did not expose the flannels that are affected 
by naval men, but the dungarees that are popular with 
merchant sailors. Sometimes a side of beef would be hung 
out in plain view; this not only kept up the fiction that the 
ship was an innocent tramp, but it served as a tempting bait 
to the not too well-fed crew of the submarine. Particularly 
tempting cargoes were occasionally put on deck. One of the 
ships carried several papier-mache freight cars of the small 
European type covered with legends which indicated that 
they were loaded with ammunition and bound for Mesopo- 
tamia. It is easy to imagine how eagerly the Hun would 
wish to sink that cargo! 

These ships were so effectively disguised that even the 
most experienced eyes could not discover their real char- 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 179 

acter. For weeks they could lie in dock, the dockmen never 
suspecting that they were armed to the teeth. Even the 
pilots who went aboard to take them into harbor never 
discovered that they were not the merchant ships which they 
pretended to be. Captain Hanrahan, who commanded the 
U. S. mystery ship Santee, based on Queenstown, once 
entertained on board an Irishman from Cork. The con- 
versation which took place between this American naval 
officer — ^who, in his disguise, was indistinguishable from a 
tramp skipper of many years' experience — disclosed the com- 
plete ignorance of the guest concerning the true character of 
the boat. 

"How do you like these Americans?" Captain Hanrahan 
innocently asked. 

"They are eating us out of house and home!" the indig- 
nant Irishman remarked. The information was a little in- 
accurate, since all our food supplies were brought from the 
United States; but the remark was reassuring as proving that 
the ship's disguise had not been penetrated. Such precau- 
tions were the more necessary in a port like Queenstown 
where our forces were surrounded by spies who were in con- 
stant communication with the enemy. 

I can personally testify to the diificulty of identifying a 
mystery ship. One day Admiral Bayly suggested that we go 
out in the harbor and visit one of these strange vessels lying 
there preparatory to sailing on a cruise. Several merchant- 
men were at anchor in port. We steamed close around one 
in the Admiral's barge and examined her very carefully 
through our glasses from a short distance. Concluding that 
this was not the vessel we were seeking, we went to another 
merchantman. This did not show any signs of being a 
mystery ship; we therefore hailed the skipper, who told us 
the one which we had first visited was the mystery ship. We 
went back, boarded her, and began examining her ap- 
pliances. The crew was dressed in the ordinary sloppy 
clothes of a merchantman's deckhands; the officers wore the 



i8o THE VICTORY AT SEA 

usual merchant ship uniform, and everything was as un- 
miHtary as a merchant ship usually is. The vessel had quite 
a long deckhouse built of light steel. The captain told us 
that two guns were concealed within this structure; he 
suggested that we walk all around it and see if we could 
point out from a close inspection the location of the guns. 
We searched carefully, but were utterly unable to discover 
where the guns were. The captain then sent the crew to 
quarters and told us to stand clear. At the word of com- 
mand one of the plates of the perpendicular side of the deck- 
house slid out of the way as quickly as a flash. The rail at 
the ship's side in front of the gun fell down and a boat davit 
swung out of the way. At the same time the gun crew 
swung the gun out and fired a primer to indicate how quickly 
they could have fired a real shot. The captain also showed 
us a boat upside down on the deckhouse — merchantmen 
frequently carry one boat in this position. At a word a lever 
was pulled down below and the boat reared up in the air 
and revealed underneath a gun and its crew. On the poop 
was a large crate about 6x6x8 or lo feet. At a touch of the 
lever the sides of this crate fell down and revealed another 
gun. 

Ill 

FOR the greater part of 19 17 from twenty to thirty of 
these ships sailed back and forth in the Atlantic, always 
choosing those parts of the seas where they were most 
likely to meet submarines. They were "merchantmen" 
of all kinds — tramp steamers, coasting vessels, trawlers, 
and schooners. Perhaps the most distressing part of ex- 
istence on one of these ships was its monotony: day 
would follow day; week would follow week; and sometimes 
months would pass without encountering a single submarine. 
Captain Campbell himself spent nine months on his first 
mystery ship before even sighting an enemy, and many of his 
successors had a similar experience. The mystery boat was a 



DECOYING SUBMARINES i8i 

patient fisherman, constantly expecting a bite and frequently 
going for long periods without the slightest nibble. This 
kind of an existence was not only disappointing but also 
exceedingly nerve racking; all during this waiting period the 
officers and men had to keep themselves constantly at at- 
tention; the vaudeville show which they were maintaining 
for the benefit of a possible periscope had to go on con- 
tinuously; a moment's forgetfulness or relaxation might be- 
tray their secret, and make their experiment a failure. The 
fearful tediousness of this kind of life had a more nerve- 
racking effect upon the officers and men than the most 
exciting battles, and practically all the mystery ship men 
who broke down fell victims not to the dangers of their en- 
terprise, but to this dreadful tension of sailing for weeks 
and months without coming to close quarters with their 
enemy. 

About the most welcome sight to a mystery ship, after a 
period of inactivity, was the wake of a torpedo speeding in its 
direction. Nothing could possibly disappoint it more than 
Vo see this torpedo pass astern or forward without hitting the 
vessel. In such a contingency the genuine merchant ship 
would make every possible effort to turn out of the torpedo's 
way: the helmsman of the mystery ship, however, would take 
all possible precautions to see that his vessel was hit. This, 
however, he had to do with the utmost cleverness, else the 
fact that he was attempting to collide with several hundred 
pounds of gun cotton would in itself betray him to the sub- 
marine. Not improbably several members of the crew 
might be killed when the torpedo struck, but that was all 
part of the game which they were playing. More import- 
ant than the lives of the men was the fate of the ship; if 
this could remain afloat long enough to give the gunners a 
good chance at the submarine, everybody on board would 
be satisfied. There was, however, little danger that the 
mystery ship would go down immediately; for all avail- 
able cargo space had been filled with wood, which gave the 



i82 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

vessel sufficient buoyancy sometimes to survive many tor« 
pedoes. 

Of course this, as well as all the other details of the vessel, 
was unknown to the skipper of the submerged submarine. 
Having struck his victim in a vital spot, he had every reason 
to believe that it would disappear beneath the waves within 
a reasonable period. The business of the disguised merchant- 
man was to encourage this delusion in every possible way. 
From the time that the torpedo struck, the mystery ship 
behaved precisely as the everyday cargo carrier, caught in a 
sfmilar predicament, would have done. A carefully drilled 
contingent of the crew, known as the "panic party," enacted 
the role of the men on a torpedoed vessel. They ran to and 
fro on the deck, apparently in a state of high consternation, 
now rushing below and emerging with some personal treasure, 
perhaps an old suit of clothes tucked under the arm, perhaps 
the ship's cat or parrot, or a small handbag hastily stuffed 
with odds and ends. Under the control of the navigating 
officer these men would make for a lifeboat, which they 
would lower in realistic fashion — sometimes going so far, in 
their stage play, as to upset it, leaving the men puffing and 
scrambling in the water. One member of the crew, usually 
the navigator, dressed up as the "captain," did his best to 
surpervise these operations. Finally, after everybody had 
left, and the vessel was settling at bow or stern, the 
"captain" would come to the side, cast one final glance at his 
sinking ship, drop a roll of papers into a lifeboat — ostensibly 
the precious documents which were so coveted by the sub- 
marine as an evidence of success — lower himself with one or 
two companions, and row in the direction of the other life- 
boats. Properly placing these lifeboats, after "abandoning 
ship," was itself one of the finest points in the plot. If the 
submarine rose to the surface it would invariably steer first 
for those little boats, looking for prisoners or the ship's 
papers; the boats' crews, therefore, had instructions to take up 
a station on a bearing from which the ship's guns could most 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 183 

successfully rake the submarine. That this manoeuvre in- 
volved great danger to the men in the lifeboats was a matter 
of no consideration in the desperate enterprise in which they 
were engaged. 

Thus to all outward appearance this performance was 
merely the torpedoing of a helpless merchant vessel. Yet 
the average German commander became altogether too wary 
to accept the situation in that light. He had no intention of 
approaching either lifeboats or the ship until entirely satisfied 
that he was not dealing with one of the decoy vessels which he 
so greatly feared. There was only one way of satisfying 
himself: that was to shell the ship so mercilessly that, in his 
opinion, if any human beings had remained aboard, they 
would have been killed or forced to surrender. The sub- 
marine therefore arose at a distance of two or three miles. 
Possibly the mystery ship, with one well-aimed shot, might 
hit the submarine at this distance, but the chances were 
altogether against her. To fire such a shot, of course, 
would immediately betray the fact that a gun crew still re- 
mained on board, and that the vessel was a mystery ship; 
and on this discovery the submarine would submerge, 
approach the vessel under water, and give her one or two 
more torpedoes. No, whatever the temptation, the crew 
must "play 'possum," and not by so much as a wink let the 
submarine knowthat there was any living thing on board. But 
this experience demanded heroism that almost approaches 
the sublime. The gun crews lay prone beside their guns, 
waiting the word of command to fire; the captain lay on the 
screened bridge, watching the whole proceeding through a 
peephole, with voice tubes near at hand with which he could 
constantly talk to his men. They maintained these positions 
sometimes for hours, never lifting a finger in defence, while 
the submarine, at a safe distance, showered hundreds of 
shells upon the ship. These horrible missiles would shriek 
above their heads; they would land on the decks, constantly 
wounding the men, sometimes killing whole gun crews — yet, 



i84 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

although the ship might become a mass of blood and broken 
fragments of human bodies, the survivors would lie low, 
waiting, with infinite patience, until the critical moment 
arrived. This was the way they took to persuade the sub- 
marine that their ship was what it pretended to be, a tramp, 
that there was nothing alive on board, and that it could 
safely come near. The still cautious German, after an hour 
or so of this kind of execution, would submerge and approach 
within a few hundred yards. All that the watchful eye at the 
peephole could see, however, was the periscope; this would 
sail all around the vessel, sometimes at a distance of fifty or a 
hundred feet. Clearly the German was taking no chances; 
he was examining his victim inch by inch, looking for the 
slightest sign that the vessel was a decoy. All this time the 
captain and crew were lying taut, holding their breath, not 
moving a muscle, hardly winking an eyelid, the captain 
with his mouth at the voice pipe ready to give the order to 
let the false works drop the moment the submarine emerged, 
the gun crews ready to fire at a second's warning. But the 
cautious periscope, having completed the inspection of the 
ship, would start in the direction of the drifting lifeboats. 
This ugly eye would stick itself up almost in the faces of the 
anxious crew, evidently making a microscopical examination 
of the clothes, faces, and general personnel, to see if it could 
detect under their tramp steamer clothes any traces of naval 
officers and men. 

Still the anxious question was, would the submarine 
emerge? Until it should do so the ship's crew was absolutely 
helpless. There was no use in shooting at the submerged 
boat, as shots do not penetrate the water but bounce ofi^ the 
surface as they do off solid ice. Everybody knew that the 
German under the water was debating that same question. 
To come up to the surface so near a mystery ship he knew 
meant instant death and the loss of his submarine; yet to 
go away under water meant that the sinking ship, if a 
merchantman, might float long enough to be salvaged, and 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 185 

it meant also that he would never be able to prove that he 
had accomplished anything with his valuable torpedo. Had 
he not shelled the derelict so completely that nothing could 
possibly survive? Had he not examined the thing minutely 
and discovered nothing amiss? It must be remembered 
that in 19 17 a submarine went through this same procedure 
with every ship that did not sink very soon after being tor- 
pedoed, and that, in nearly every case, it discovered, after 
emerging, that it had been dealing with a real merchant- 
man. Already this same submarine had wasted hours and 
immense stores of ammunition on vessels that were not mys- 
tery ships, but harmless tramps, and all these false alarms 
had made it impatient and careless. In most cases, therefore, 
the crew had only to bide its time. The captain knew that 
his hidden enemy would finally rise. 

"Standby!" 

This command would come softly through the speaking 
tubes to the men at the guns. The captain on the bridge had 
noticed the preliminary disturbance on the water that pre- 
ceded the emergence of the submarine. In a few seconds the 
whole boat would be floating on top, and the officers and 
crews would climb out on the deck, eager for booty. And 
this within a hundred yards of four or five guns ! 

"Let go!" 

This command came at the top of the voice, for conceal- 
ment was nowno longer necessary. In a twinkling up went the 
battle flag, bulwarks fell down, lifeboats on decks collapsed, 
revealing guns, sides dropped from deckhouses, hen-coops, 
and other innocent -looking structures. The apparently 
sinking merchantman became a volcano of smoke and 
fire; scores of shells dropped upon the submarine, punching 
holes in her frail hull, hurling German sailors high into the 
air, sometimes decapitating them or blowing off their arms or 
legs. The whole horrible scene lasted only a few seconds 
before the helpless vessel would take its final plunge to the 
depths, leaving perhaps two or three survivors, a mass of oil 



i86 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

and wood, and still more ghastly wreckage, to mark the spot 
where another German submarine had paid the penalty of 
its crimes. 

IV 

IT WAS entirely characteristic of this strange war that the 
greatest exploit of any of the mystery ships was in one 
sense a failure — that is, it did not succeed in destroying 
the submarine which attacked it. 

On an August day in 19 17 the British "merchant steamer" 
Dunraven was zigzagging across the Bay of Biscay. Even to 
the expert eye she was a heavily laden cargo vessel bound for 
Gibraltar and the Mediterranean, probably carrying sup- 
plies to the severely pressed Allies in Italy and the East. On 
her stern a 2^-pounder gun, clearly visible to all observers, 
helped to emphasize this impression. Yet the apparently 
innocent Dunraven was a far more serious enemy to the sub- 
marine than appeared on the surface. The mere fact that 
the commander was not an experienced merchant salt, but 
Captain Gordon Campbell, of the Royal Navy, in itself 
would have made the Dunraven an object of terror to any 
lurking submarine, for Captain Campbell's name was a 
familiar one to the Germans by this time. Yet it would have 
taken a careful investigation to detect in the rough and un- 
kempt figure of Captain Campbell any resemblance to an 
officer of the British navy, or to identify the untidy seamen 
as regularly enrolled British sailors. The armament of the 
Dunraven, could one have detected it, would have provided 
the greatest surprises. This vessel represented the final per- 
fection of the mystery ship. Though seemingly a harmless 
tramp she carried a number of guns, also two torpedo tubes, 
and several depth charges; but even from her deck nothing 
was visible except the usual merchant gun aft. The stern of 
the Dunraven was a veritable arsenal. Besides the guns and 
depth charges, the magazine and shell rooms were concealed 
there; on each side of the ship a masked torpedo tube held its 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 187 

missile ready for a chance shot at a submarine; and the for- 
ward deck contained other armament. Such was the Dun- 
raven, plowing her way along, quietly and indifferently, even 
when, as on this August morning, a submarine was lying on 
the horizon, planning to make her its prey. 

As soon as the disguised merchantman spotted this enemy 
she began to behave in character. When an armed merchant 
ship got within range of a submarine on the surface she fre- 
quently let fly a shot on the chance of a hit. That was there- 
fore the proper thing for the Dunraven to do; it was 
really all a part of the game of false pretence in which she 
was engaged. However, she took pains that the shell should 
not reach the submarine; this was her means of persuading 
the U-boat that it outranged, the Dunraven' s gun and could 
safely give chase. The decoy merchantman apparently put 
on extra steam when the submarine started in her direction at 
top speed; here, again, however, the proper manoeuvre was 
not to run too fast, for her real mission was to get caught. 
On the other hand, had she slowed down perceptibly, that in 
itself would have aroused suspicion ; her game, therefore, was 
to decrease speed gradually so that the U-boat would think 
that it was overtaking its enemy by its own exertions. All 
during this queer kind of a chase the submarine and the 
cargo ship were peppering each other with shells, one seri- 
ously, the other merely in pretence. The fact that a naval 
crew, with such a fme target as an exposed submarine, could 
shoot with a conscious effort not to hit, but merely to lure the 
enemy to a better position, in itself is an eloquent evidence of 
the perfect discipline which prevailed in the mystery ship 
service. Not to aim a fair shot upon the detested vessel, 
when there was a possibility of hitting it, was almost too 
much to ask of human "nature. But it was essential to 
success with these vessels never to fire with the inten- 
tion of hitting unless there was a practical certainty of 
sinking the submarine; all energies were focussed upon the 
supreme task of inducing the enemy to expose itself com- 



i88 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

pletely within three or four hundred yards of the disguised 
freighter. 

In an hour or two the submarine landed a shot that seemed 
to have done serious damage. At least huge clouds of steam 
arose from the engine-room, furnishing external evidence that 
the engines or boilers had been disabled. The submarine 
commander did not know that this was a trick; that the 
vessel was fitted with a specially arranged pipe around the 
engine-room hatch which could emit these bursts of steam 
at a moment's notice, all for the purpose of making him 
believe that the vitals of the ship had been irreparably 
damaged. The stopping of the ship, the blowing oif of the 
safety valve, and the appearance of the "panic party" im- 
mediately after this ostensible hit made the illusion complete. 
This "panic party" was particularly panicky; one of the life- 
boats was let go with a run, one fall at a time, thus dumping 
its occupants into the sea. Ultimately, however, the 
struggling swimmers were picked up and the boat rowed 
away, taking up a position where a number of the Dunraven's 
guns could get a good shot at the submarine should the 
Germans follow their usual plan of inspecting the lifeboats 
before visiting the sinking merchantman. 

So far everything was taking place according to pro- 
gramme; but presently the submarine reopened fire and 
scored a shot which gave the enemy all the advantages of the 
situation. I have described in some detail the stern of the 
ship — a variegated assortment of depth charges, shell, guns, 
and human beings. The danger of such an unavoidable 
concentration of armament and men was that a lucky shot 
might land in the midst of it. And this is precisely what 
now happened. Not only one, but three shells from the sub- 
marine one after the other struck this hidden mass of men 
and ammunition. The first one exploded a depth charge — 
300 pounds of high explosive — which blew one of the officers 
out of the after control station where he lay concealed and 
landed him on the deck several yards distant. Here he 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 189 

remained a few moments unconscious; then his associates 
saw him, wounded as he was, creeping inch by inch back into 
his control position, fortunately out of sight of the Germans. 
The seaman who was stationed at the depth charges was also 
wounded by this shot, but, despite all efforts to remove him 
to a more comfortable place, he insisted on keeping at his 
post. 

"'Ere I was put in charge of these things," he said, "and 
'ere I stays." 

Two more shells, one immediately after the other, now 
landed on the stern. Clouds of black smoke began to rise, 
and below tongues of flame presently appeared, licking their 
way in the direction of a large quantity of ammunition, 
cordite, and other high explosives. It was not decoy smoke 
and decoy flame this time. Captain Campbell, watching the 
whole proceeding from the bridge, perhaps felt something in 
the nature of a chill creeping up his spine when he realized 
that the after part of the ship, where men, explosives, and 
guns lay concealed in close proximity, was on fire. Just at 
this moment he observed that the submarine was rapidly 
approaching; and in a few minutes it lay within 400 yards of 
his guns. Captain Campbell was just about to give the 
orders to open fire when the wind took up the dense smoke 
of the fire and wafted it between his ship and the submarine. 
This precipitated one of the crises which tested to the utmost 
the discipline of the mystery ship. The captain had two 
alternatives: he could fire at the submarine through the 
smoke, taking his chances of hitting an unseen and moving 
target, or he could wait until the enemy passed around the 
ship and came up on the other side, where there would be no 
smoke to interfere with his view. It was the part of wisdom 
to choose the latter course; but under existing conditions 
such a decision involved not only great nerve, but absolute 
confidence in his men. For all this time the fire at the stern 
was increasing in fierceness; in a brief period, Captain Camp- 
bell knew, a mass of ammunition and depth charges would 



I90 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

explode, probably killing or frightfully wounding every one 
of the men who were stationed there. If he should wait un- 
til the U-boat made the tour of the ship and reached the side 
that was free of smoke the chances were that this explosion 
would take place before a gun could be fired. On the other 
hand, if he should fire through the smoke, there was little 
likelihood of hitting the submarine. 

Those who are acquainted with the practical philosophy 
which directed operations in this war will readily foresee the 
choice which was now made. The business of mystery ships, 
as of all anti-submarine craft, was to sink the enemy. All 
other considerations amounted to nothing when this supreme 
object was involved. The lives of officers and men, precious 
as they were under ordinary circumstances, were to be im- 
mediately sacrificed if such a sacrifice would give an oppor- 
tunity of destroying the submarine. It was therefore 
Captain Campbell's duty to wait for the under-water boat to 
sail slowly around his ship and appear in clear view on the 
starboard side, leaving his brave men at the stern exposed to 
the fire, every minute raging more fiercely, and to the likeli- 
hood of a terrific explosion. That he was able to make this 
decision, relying confidently upon the spirit of his crew and 
their loyal devotion to their leader, again illustrates the iron 
discipline which was maintained on the mystery ships. The 
first explosion had destroyed the voice tube by means of 
which Captain Campbell communicated with this gun crew. 
He therefore had to make his decision without keeping his 
men informed of the progress of events — information very 
helpful to men under such a strain; but he well knew that 
these men would understand his action and cheerfully accept 
their role in the game. Yet the agony of their position 
tested their self-control to the utmost. The deck on which 
they lay every moment became hotter; the leather of their 
shoes began to smoke, but they refused to budge — for to 
flee to a safer place meant revealing themselves to the sub- 
marine and thereby betraying their secret. They took the 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 191 

boxes of cordite shells in their arms and held them up as high 
as possible above the smouldering deck in the hope of pre- 
venting an explosion which seemed inevitable. Never did 
Christian martyrs, stretched upon a gridiron, suffer with 
greater heroism. 

V 

IT WAS probably something of a relief when the expected 
explosion took place. The submarine had to go only 
200 yards more to be under the fire of three guns at a range 
of 400 yards, but just as it was rounding the stern the Ger- 
man officers and men, standing on the deck, were greeted 
with a terrific roar. Suddenly a conglomeration of men, 
guns, and unexploded shells was hurled into the air. The 
German crew, of course, had believed that the vessel was 
a deserted hulk, and this sudden manifestation of life on 
board not only tremendously startled them, but threw them 
into a panic. The 4-inch gun and its crew was blown 
high into the air, the gun landing forward on the well 
deck, and the crew in various places. One man fell into 
the water; he was picked up, not materially the worse for 
his experience, by the Dunravens lifeboat, which, all this 
time, had been drifting in the neighborhood. It is one of 
the miracles of this war that not one of the members of that 
crew was killed. The gashed and bleeding bodies of several 
were thrown back upon the deck; but there were none so 
seriously wounded that they did not recover. In the minds 
of these men, however, their own sufferings were not the 
most distressing consequences of the explosion; the really 
unfortunate fact was that the sudden appearance of men 
and guns in the air informed the Germans that they had to 
deal with one of the ships which they so greatly dreaded. 
The game, so far as the Dunraven was concerned, was ap- 
parently up. The submarine vanished under the water; 
and the Englishmen well knew that the next move would be 
the firing of the torpedo which could confidently be expected 



ig2 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

to end the Q-boat's career. Some of the crew who were not 
incapacitated got a hose and attempted to put out the fire 
while others removed their wounded comrades to as com- 
fortable quarters as could be found. Presently the wake of 
the torpedo could be seen approaching the ship; the explosion 
that followed was a terrible one. The concussion of the 
previous explosion had set off the "open-fire" buzzers at the 
gun positions — these buzzers being the usual signals for 
dropping the false work that concealed the guns and begin- 
ning the fight. The result was that, before the torpedo had 
apparently given the Dunraven its quietus, all the remaining 
guns were exposed with their crews. Captain Campbell 
now decided to fight to the death. He sent out a message 
notifying all destroyers and other anti-submarine craft, as 
well as all merchant ships, not to approach within thirty 
miles. A destroyer, should she appear, would force the 
German to keep under water, and thus prevent the Dunraven 
from getting a shot. Another merchant ship on the horizon 
might prove such a tempting bait to the submarine that it 
would abandon the Dunraven, now clearly done for — all on 
fire at one end as she was and also sinking from her torpedo 
wound — and so prevent any further combat. For the 
resourceful Captain Campbell had already formulated an- 
other final plan by which he might entice the submarine to 
rise within range of his guns. To carry out this plan, he 
wanted plenty of sea room and no interference; so he drew a 
circle in the water, with a radius of thirty miles, inclosing 
the space which was to serve as the "prize ring" for the 
impending contest. 

His idea was to fall in with the German belief that the 
Dunraven had reached the end of her tether. A hastily 
organized second "panic party" jumped into a remaining 
lifeboat and a raft and rowed away from the sinking, burning 
ship. Here was visible evidence to the Germans that their 
enemies had finally abandoned the fight after nearly four 
hours of as frightful gruelling as any ship had ever received. 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 193 

But there were still two guns that were concealed and work- 
able; there were, as already said, two torpedo tubes, one on 
each beam; and a handful of men were kept on board to 
man these. Meanwhile, Captain Campbell lay prone on the 
bridge, looking through a peephole for the appearance of the 
submarine, constantly talking to his men through the tubes, 
even joking them on their painful vigil. 

" If you know a better 'ole," he would say, quoting Bairns- 
father, "go to it!" 

"Remember, lads," he would call at another time, "that 
the King has given this ship the V. C." 

Every situation has its humorous aspects. Thus one 
gun crew could hardly restrain its laughter when a blue- 
jacket called up to Captain Campbell and asked if he could 
not take his boots off. He came of a respectable family, he 
explained, and did not think it becoming to die with his boots 
on. But the roar of the fire, which had now engulfed the 
larger part of the ship, and the constantly booming shells, 
which were exploding, one after another, like mammoth 
firecrackers, interfered, with much conversation. For twenty 
minutes everybody lay there, hoping and praying that the 
U-boat would emerge. 

The German ultimately came up, but he arose cautiously 
at the stern of the ship, at a point from which the guns of 
the Dunraven could not bear. On the slim chance that a 
few men might be left aboard the submarine shelled it for 
several minutes, fore and aft, then, to the agony of the 
watching Englishmen, it again sank beneath the waves. 
Presently the periscope shot up, and began moving slowly 
around the blazing derelict, its eye apparently taking in 
every detail; he was so cautious, that submarine commander, 
he did not propose to be outwitted again ! Captain Camp- 
bell now saw that he had only one chance; the conflagration 
was rapidly destroying his vessel, and he could spend no 
more time waiting for the submarine to rise. But he had 
two torpedoes and he determined to use these against the 



194 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

submerged submarine. As the periscope appeared abeam 
one of the Dunravens torpedoes started in its direction; 
the watching gunners almost wept when it missed by a few 
inches. But the submarine did not see it, and the periscope 
calmly appeared on the other side of the ship. The second 
torpedo was fired; this also passed just about a foot astern, 
and the submarine saw it. The game was up. What was 
left of the Dunraven was rapidly sinking, and Captain Camp- 
bell sent out a wireless for help. In a few minutes the U. S. 
armed yacht Noma and the British destroyers Alcock and 
Christopher, which had been waiting outside the "prize 
ring," arrived and took off the crew. The tension of the 
situation was somewhat relieved when a "Jackie" in one of 
the "panic" boats, caught sight of his beloved captain, 
entirely uninjured, jumping on one of the destroyers. 

"Gawd!" he shouted, in a delighted tone, "if there ain't 
the skipper still alive!" 

"We deeply regret the loss of His Majesty's ship," said 
Captain Campbell, in his report, "and still more the escape 
of the enemy. We did our best, not only to destroy the 
enemy and save the ship, but also to show ourselves worthy 
of the Victoria Cross which the King recently bestowed on 
the ship." 

They did indeed. My own opinion of this performance I 
expressed in a letter which I could not refrain from writing to 
Captain Campbell: 

My dear Captain: 

I have just read your report of the action between the Dunraven 
and a submarine on August 8th, last. 

I have had the benefit of reading the reports of some of your 
former exploits, and Admiral Bayly has told me about them all; but 
in my opinion this of the Dunraven is the finest of all as a military 
action and the most deserving of complete success. 

It was purely incidental that the sub escaped. That was due, 
moreover, to an unfortunate piece of bad luck. The engagement, 
judged as a skilful fight, and not measured by its material results. 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 195 

seems to me to have been perfectly successful, because I do not 
think that even you, with all your experience in such affairs, could 
conceive of any feature of the action that you would alter if you 
had to do it over again. According to my idea about such matters, 
the standard set by you and your crew is worth infinitely more than 
the destruction of a submarine. Long after we both are dust and 
ashes, the story of this last fight will be a valuable inspiration to 
British (and American) naval officers and men — a demonstration 
of the extraordinary degree to which the patriotism, loyalty, 
personal devotion, and bravery of a crew may be inspired. 1 know 
nothing finer in naval history than the conduct of the after-gun's 
crew — in fact, the entire crew of the Dunraven. It goes without 
saying that the credit of this behavior is chiefly yours. ... 

With my best wishes for your future success, believe me, my dear 
Captain, 

Faithfully yours, 

(Signed) Wm. S. Sims. 

The records show that the mystery ships sank twelve sub- 
marines, of which Captain Campbell accounted for four; 
yet this was perhaps not their most important achievement. 
From the German standpoint they were a terribly disturbing 
element in the general submarine situation. Externally 
a mystery ship, as already described, was indistinguishable 
from the most harmless merchantman. The cleverness 
with which the Allied officers took advantage of the vicious 
practices of the submarine commanders bewildered them still 
further. Nothing afloat was sacred to the Hun; and he 
seemed to take particular pride in destroying small vessels, 
even little sailing vessels. The Navy decided to turn this 
amiable trait to good account, and fitted out the Priie, a top- 
sail schooner of 200 tons, and placed her under the command 
of Lieut. William Sanders, R. N. R. This little schooner, 
as was expected, proved an irresistible bait. A certain sub- 
marine, commanded by one of the most experienced U-boat 
captains, attacked her by gun fire from a safe distance and, 
after her panic party had left, shelled her until she was in a 
sinking condition; many of her crew had been killed and 



196 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

wounded, when, confident that she could not be a Q-ship, 
the enemy came within less than loo yards. It was promptly 
fired on and disappeared beneath the surface. The panic 
party picked up the German captain and two men, apparently 
the only survivors, who expressed their high admiration for 
the bravery of the crew and assisted them to get their bat- 
tered craft into port. The captain said to Lieutenant 
Sanders: " I take off my hat to you and your men. 1 would 
not have believed that any men could stand such gun fire." 
For this exploit Lieutenant Sanders was awarded the Victoria 
Cross. Within about four days from the time of this action 
the Admiralty received an inquiry via Sweden through the 
Red Cross asking the whereabouts of the captain of this 
submarine. This showed that the vessel had reached her 
home port, and illustrated once more the necessity for cau- 
tion in claiming the destruction of U-boats and the wisdom 
of declining to publish the figures of sinkings. Unfortu- 
nately, the plucky little Pri^e was subsequently lost with her 
gallant captain and crew. 

So great was the desire of our people to take some part in 
the mystery ship campaign that I took steps to satisfy their 
legitimate ambition. As the Navy had fitted out no mystery 
ships of our own, I requested the Admiralty to assign one 
for our use. This was immediately agreed to by Admiral 
Jellicoe and, with the approval of the Navy Department, 
the vessel was delivered and named the Santee, after our old 
sailing man-of-war of that name. We called for volunteers, 
and practically all the officers and men of the forces based 
on Queenstown clamored for this highly interesting though 
hazardous service. Commander David C. Hanrahan was 
assigned as her commander, and two specially selected men 
were taken from each of our vessels, thus forming an ex- 
ceedingly capable crew. The ship was disguised with great 
skill and, with the invaluable advice of Captain Campbell, 
the crew was thoroughly trained in all the fine points of the 
game. 



DECOYING SUBMARINES 197 

One December evening the Santee sailed from Queenstown 
for Bantry Bay to carry out intensive training. A short 
time after she left port she was struck by a torpedo which 
caused great damage, but so solidly was her hull packed with 
wood that she remained afloat. The panic party got off in 
most approved style, and for several hours the Santee awaited 
developments, hoping for a glimpse of the submarine. But 
the under-water boat never disclosed its presence; not even 
the tip of a periscope showed itself; and the Santee was towed 
back to Queenstown. 

The Santee' s experience was that of many mystery ships 
of 19 18. The Germans had learned their lesson. 

For this reason it is desirable to repeat and emphasize 
that the most important accomplishment of the mystery 
ships was not the actual sinking of submarines, but their 
profound influence upon the tactics of the U-boats. It was 
manifest in the beginning that the first information reaching 
Germany concerning the mystery ships would greatly dimin- 
ish the chances of sinking submarines by this means, for it 
would cause all submarines to be wary of all mercantile 
craft. They were therefore obliged largely to abandon the 
easy, safe, and cheap methods of sinking ships by bombs or 
gun fire, and were consequently forced to incur the danger of 
attacking with the scarce and expensive torpedo. Moreover, 
barring the very few vessels that could be sunk by long-range 
gun fire, they were practically restricted to this method of 
attack on pain of abandoning the submarine campaign alto- 
gether. 




CHAPTER VI 

AMERICAN COLLEGE BOYS AND 
SUBCHASERS 

I 

HO would ever have thought that a little 
wooden vessel, displacing only sixty tons, 
measuring only i lo feet from bow to stem, 
and manned by officers and crew very few 
of whom had ever made an ocean voyage, could have crossed 
more than three thousand miles of wintry sea, even with the 
help of the efficient naval officers and men who, after training 
them, convoyed and guided them across, and could have done 
excellent work in hunting the submarines? We built nearly 
400 of these little vessels in eighteen months; and we sent 
170 to such widely scattered places as Plymouth, Queens- 
town, Brest, Gibraltar, and Corfu. Several enemy sub- 
marines now lie at the bottom of the sea as trophies of their 
offensive power; and on the day that hostilities ceased, the 
Allies generally recognized that this tiny vessel, with the 
"Hstening devices" which made it so efficient, represented 
one of the most satisfactory direct "answers" to the sub- 
marine which had been developed by the war. Had it not 
been that the war ended before enough destroyers could be 
spared from convoy duty to assist, with their greater speed 
and offensive power, hunting groups of these tiny craft, it 
is certain that they would soon have become a still more 
important factor in destroying submarines and interfering 
with their operations. 

The convoy system, as I have already explained, was 
essentially an offensive measure; it compelled the submarine 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 199 

to encounter its most formidable antagonist, the destroyer, 
and to risk destruction every time that it attacked merchant 
vessels. This system, however, was an indirect offensive, 
or, to use the technical phrase, it was a defensive-offensive. 
Its great success in protecting merchant shipping, and the 
indispensable service which it performed to the cause of 
civilization, I have already described. But the fact re- 
mained that there could be no final solution of the submarine 
problem, barring breaking down the enemy morale, until a 
definite, direct method of attacking these boats had been 
found. A depth charge, fired from the deck of a destroyer, 
was a serious matter for the submarine; still the submarine 
could avoid this deadly weapon at any time by simply con- 
cealing its whereabouts when in danger of attack. The 
destroyer could usually sink the submarine whenever it could 
get near enough ; it was for the under-water boat, however, to 
decide whether an engagement should take place. That 
great advantage in warfare, the option of fighting or of run- 
ning away, always lay v/ith the submarine. Until it was pos- 
sible for our naval forces to set out to sea, find the enemy 
that was constantly assailing our commerce, and destroy him, 
it was useless to maintain that we had discovered the anti- 
submarine tactics which would drive this pest from the ocean 
for all time. Though the convoy, the mine-fields, the mystery 
ships, the airplane, and several other methods of fighting 
the under-water boat had been developed, the submarine 
could still utilize that one great quality of invisibility which 
made any final method of attacking it such a difficult problem. 
Thus, despite the wonderful work which had been accomp- 
lished by the convoy, the Allied effort to destroy the sub- 
marine was still largely a game of blind man's buff. In our 
struggle against the German campaign we were deprived of 
one of the senses which for ages had been absolutely neces- 
sary to military operations — that of sight. We were con- 
stantly attempting to destroy an enemy whom we could not 
see. So far as this offensive on the water was concerned, the 



200 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Allies found themselves in the position of a man who has 
suddenly gone blind. I make this comparison advisedly 
for it at once suggests that our situation was not entirely 
hopeless. The man who loses the use of his eyes suffers 
a terrible aifliction; yet this calamity does not completely 
destroy his usefulness. Such a person, if normally intel- 
ligent, gradually learns how to fmd his way around in dark- 
ness; first he slowly discovers how to move about his room; 
then about his house, then about his immediate neighbor- 
hood; and ultimately he becomes so expert that he can be 
trusted to walk alone in crowded streets, to pilot himself 
up and down strange buildings, and even to go on long 
journeys. In time he learns to read, to play cards and chess, 
and not infrequently even to resume his old profession or 
occupation; indeed his existence, despite the deprivation 
of what many regard as the most indispensable of the senses, 
becomes again practically a normal process. His whole 
experience, of course, is one of the most beautiful demonstra- 
tions we have of the exquisite economy of Nature. What 
has happened in the case of this stricken man is that his 
other senses have come to fill the place of the one which he 
has lost. Deprived of sight, he is forced to form his contacts 
with the external world by using his other senses, especially 
those of touch and hearing. So long as he could see clearly 
these senses had lain half developed ; he had never used them 
to any extent that remotely approached their full powers; 
but now that they are called into constant action they 
gradually increase in strength to a degree that seems ab- 
normal, precisely as a disused muscle, when regularly ex- 
ercised, acquires a hitherto unsuspected vigor. 

This illustration applies to the predicament in which the 
Allied navies now found themselves. When they attempted 
to fight the submarine they discovered that they had gone 
hopelessly blind. Like the sightless man, however, they still 
had other senses left; and it remained for them to develop 
these to take the place of the one of which they had been 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 2or 

deprived. The faculty which it seemed most likely that they 
could increase by stimulation was that of hearing. Our 
men could not detect the presence of the submarine with 
their eyes; could they not do so with their ears? Their 
eriemy could make himself unseen at will, but he could not 
make himself unheard, except by stopping his motors. In 
fact, when the submarine was under water the vibrations, 
due to the peculiar shape of its propellers and hull, and to its 
electric motors, produced sound waves that resembled 
nothing else in art or nature. It now clearly became the 
business of naval science to take advantage of this pheno- 
menon to track the submarine after it had submerged. Once 
this feat had been accomplished, the only advantage which 
the under-water boat possessed over other warcraft, that of 
invisibility, would be overcome; and, inasmuch as the sub- 
marine, except for this quality of invisibility, was a far weaker 
vessel than any other afloat, the complete elimination of this 
advantage would dispose of it as a formidable enemy in war. 
A fact that held forth hopes of success was that water is an 
excellent conductor of sound — far better than the atmosphere 
itself. In the air there are many cross-currents and areas 
of varying temperature which make sound waves fre- 
quently behave in most puzzling fashion, sometimes travel- 
ling in circles, sometimes moving capriciously up or down or 
even turning sharp corners. The mariner has learned how 
deceptive is a foghorn; when it is blowing he knows that a 
ship is somewhere in the general region, but usually he has 
no definite idea where. The water, however, is uniform 
in density and practically uniform in temperature, and there- 
fore sound in this medium always travels in straight lines. 
It also travels more rapidly in water than in the air, it 
travels farther, and the sound waves are more distinct. Amer- 
ican inventors have been the pioneers in making practical 
use of this well-known principle. Before the war its most 
valuable applications were the submarine bell and the vibra- 
tor. On many Atlantic and Pacific points these instruments 



202 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

had been placed under the water, provided with mechanisms 
which caused them to sound at regular intervals; an ingeni- 
ous invention, installed aboard ships, made it possible for 
trained listeners to pick up these noises, and so fix positions, 
long before lighthouses or lightships came into view in any 
but entirely clear weather. For several years the great 
trans-Atlantic liners have frequently made Nantucket Light- 
ship by listening for its submarine bell. From the United 
States this system was rapidly extending all over the world. 
American inventors were therefore well qualified to deal 
with this problem of communicating by sound under the 
water. A listening device placed on board ship, which would 
reveal to practised ears the noise of a submarine at a rea- 
sonable distance, and which would at the same time give its 
direction, would come near to solving the most serious 
problem presented by the German tactics. Even before the 
United States entered the war, American specialists had 
started work on their own initiative. In particular the Gen- 
eral Electric Company, the Western Electric Company, and 
the Submarine Signal Company had taken up the matter at 
their own expense; each had a research department and an 
experimental station where a large amount of preliminary 
work had been done. Soon a special board was created at 
Washington to study detection devices, to which each of 
these companies was invited to send a representative; the 
board eventually took up its headquarters at New London, 
and was assisted in this work by some of the leading physi- 
cists of our universities. All through the summer and fall 
of 19 1 7 these men kept industriously at their task; to such 
good purpose did they labor that by October of that year 
several devices had been invented which seemed to promise 
satisfactory results. In beginning their labors they had one 
great advantage: European scientists had already made 
considerable progress in this work, and the results of their 
studies were at once placed at our disposal by the Allied 
Admiralties. Moreover, these Admiralties sent over several 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 203 

of their experts to cooperate with us. About that time 
Captain Richard H. Leigh, U. S. N., who had been assigned 
to command the subchaser detachments abroad, was sent to 
Europe to confer with the AlHed Admiralties, and to test, in 
actual operations against submarines, the detection devices 
which had been developed at the New London station. Cap- 
tain Leigh, who after the armistice became my chief-of-staff 
at London, was not only one of our ablest officers, but he 
had long been interested in detection devices, and was a great 
believer in their possibilities. 

The British, of course, received Captain Leigh cordially and 
gave him the necessary facilities for experimenting with his 
devices, but it was quite apparent that they did not anticipate 
any very satisfactory results. The trouble was that so many 
inventors had presented new ideas which had proved use- 
less that we were all more or less doubtful. They had been 
attempting to solve this problem ever since the beginning of 
the war; British inventors had developed several promising 
hydrophones, but these instruments had not proved efficient 
in locating a submarine with sufficient accuracy to enable 
us to destroy it with depth charges. These disappointments 
quite naturally created an atmosphere of skepticism which, 
however, did not diminish the energy which was devoted to 
the solution of this important problem. Accordingly, three 
British trawlers and a "P"* boat were assigned to Captain 
Leigh, and with these vessels he spent ten days in the Chan- 
nel, testing impartially both the British and American de- 
vices. No detailed tactics for groups of vessels had yet been 
elaborated for hunting by sound. Though the ships used 
were not particularly suitable for the work in hand, these few 
days at sea demonstrated that the American contrivances 
were superior to anything in the possession of the Allies. 
They were by no means perfect ; but the ease with which they 
picked up all kinds of noises, particularly those made by 

*A "P" boat is a special type of anti-submarine craft smaller and slower than a 
destroyer and having a profile especially designed to resemble that of a submarine. 



204 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

submarines, astonished everybody who was let into the 
secret ; the conviction that such a method of tracking the hid- 
den enemy might ultimately be used with the desired success 
now became more or less general. In particular the American 
" K-tubes" and the "C-tubes" proved superior to the" Nash- 
fish" and the "Shark-fm," the two devices which up to that 
time had been the favorites in the British navy. The 
"K-tubes" easily detected the sound of large vessels at a 
distance of 20 miles, while the "C-tubes" were more useful 
at a shorter distance. But the greatest advantage which these 
new listening machines had over those of other navies was 
that they could more efficiently determine not only the sound 
but also the direction from which it came. Captain Leigh, 
after this demonstration, visited several British naval sta- 
tions, consulting with the British officers, explaining our 
sound-detection devices, and testing the new appliances in all 
kinds of conditions. The net result of his trip was a general 
reversal of opinion on the value of this method of hunting 
submarines. The British Admiralty ordered from the 
United States large quantities of the American mechanisms, 
and also began manufacturing them in England. 

About the time that it was shown that these listening de- 
vices would probably have great practical value, the first 
"subchasers" were delivered at New London, Conn. The 
design of the subchaser type was based upon what proved 
to be a misconception as to the cruising possibilities of the 
submarine. Just before the beginning of the Great War 
most naval officers believed that the limitations of the 
submarine were such that it could not operate far from 
coastal waters. Hardly any one, except a few experienced 
submarine officers, had regarded it as possible that these 
small boats could successfully attack vessels upon the high 
seas or remain for any extended period away from their base. 
High authorities condemned them. This is hard to realize, 
now that we know so well the offensive possibilities of sub- 
marines, but we have ample evidence as to what former opin- 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 205 

ions were. For example, a distinguished naval writer says 
that at that tirne "The view of the majority of admirals and 
captains probably was that submersible craft were 'just 
marvellous toys, good for circus performances in carefully 
selected places in fine weather.'" He adds that certain 
very prominent naval men of great experience declared that 
the submarine "could operate only by day in fair weather; 
that it was practically useless in misty weather"; that it had 
to come to the surface to fire its torpedo; that its "crowning 
defect lay in its want of habitability"; that "a week's peace 
manoeuvres got to the bottom of the health of officers and 
men"; and that "on the high seas the chances [of successful 
attack] will be few, and submarines will require for their ex- 
istence parent ships." The first triumph of Otto Weddingen, 
that of sinking the Cressy, the Hogue, and the Ahoukir, did 
not change this conviction, for these three warships had been 
sunk in comparatively restricted waters under conditions 
which were very favorable to the submarine. It was hot 
until the Audacious went to the bottom off the northwest 
coast of Ireland, many hundreds of miles from any German 
submarine base, that the possibilities of this new weapon 
were partially understood ; for it was clear that the Audacious 
had been sunk by a mine, and that that mine must have been 
laid by a submarine. Even then many doubted the ability 
of the U-boats to operate successfully in the open sea west- 
ward of the British Isles. Therefore the subchaser was de- 
signed to fight the submarine in restricted waters; Great 
Britain and France ordered more than 500 smaller (80-foot) 
vessels of this type, or of approximately this type, built in 
the United States; and just before our declaration of war 
the United States had designed and contracted for several 
hundred of a somewhat larger size (the iio-foot chasers) 
with the original idea of using them as patrol boats near the 
harbors and coastal waters of our own country. Long be- 
fore these vessels were finished, however, it became apparent 
that Germany could not engage in any serious, extensive 



2o6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

campaign on this side; it was also evident that any vessel as 
small as the subchaser had little value in convoy work, not- 
withstanding the excellence of its sea-keeping qualities; and 
we were all rather doubtful as to just what use we could 
make of these new additions to our navy. 

The work of pushing the design and construction of these 
boats reflects great credit upon those who were chiefly re- 
sponsible. The designs were drawn and the first contracts 
were placed before the United States had declared war. 
The credit for this admirable work belongs chiefly to Com- 
mander Julius A. Purer (Construction Corps), U. S. Navy, 
and to Mr. A. Loring Swasey, a yacht architect of Boston, 
who was enrolled as a lieutenant-commander in the reserves, 
and who served throughout the war as an adviser and assist- 
ant to Commander Purer in his specialty as a small vessel 
designer, particularly in wood. It speaks well for the ability 
of these officers that the small subchasers exhibited such re- 
markable sea-keeping qualities ; this fact was a pleasant sur- 
prise to all seagoing men, particularly to naval officers who 
had had little experience with that type of craft. The listen- 
ing devices had not been perfected when they were designed, 
and this innovation opened up possibilities for their employ- 
ment which had not been anticipated; for these reasons it 
inevitably took a large amount of time, after the subchasers 
had been delivered, to provide the hydrophones and all the 
several appliances which were necessary for hunting sub- 
marines. Apparently those who were responsible for con- 
structing these boats had a rocky road to travel; with the 
great demand for material and labor for building destroyers, 
m.erchant ships, and for a multitude of war supplies, it was 
natural that the demands for the subchasers in the early 
days were viewed as a nuisance; the responsible officers, there- 
fore, deserve credit for delivering these boats in such an 
efficient condition and in such a remarkably short time. 
That winter, as everyone will recall, was the coldest in the 
memory of the present generation. Day after day the poor 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 207 

subchasers, coated with ice almost a foot thick, many with 
their engines wrecked, their planking torn and their pro- 
pellers crumpled, were towed into the harbor and left at 
the first convenient mooring, where the ice immediately 
began to freeze them in. As was inevitable under such con- 
ditions, the crews, for the most part, suffered acutely in this 
terrible weather; they had had absolutely no training in or- 
dinary seamanship, to say nothing of the detailed tactics 
demanded by the difficult work in which they were to engage. 
I do not think that the whole lot contained i per cent, of 
graduates of Annapolis or 5 per cent, of experienced sailors; 
for the greater number that terrible trip in the icy ocean, 
with the thermometer several degrees below zero, and with 
very little artificial heat on board, was their first experience 
at sea. Yet there was not the slightest sign of whimpering 
or discouragement. Ignorant of salt water as these men at 
that time were, they really represented about the finest raw 
material in the nation for this service. Practically all, 
oificers and men, were civilians; a small minority were ama- 
teur yachtsmen, but the great mass were American college 
undergraduates. Boys of Yale, Harvard, Princeton — in- 
deed, of practically every college and university in the land 
— had dropped their books, left the comforts of their frater- 
nity houses, and abandoned their athletic fields, eager for the 
great adventure against the Hun. If there is any man who 
still doubts what the American system of higher education 
is doing for our country, he should have spent a few days at 
sea with these young men. That they knew nothing at first 
about navigation and naval technique was not important; 
the really important fact was that their minds were alert, 
their hearts filled with a tremendous enthusiasm for the cause, 
their souls clean, and their bodies ready for the most exhaust- 
ing tasks. Whenever I get to talking of the American 
college boys and other civilians in our navy, I find myself 
indulging in what may seem extravagant praise. I have 
even been inclined to suggest that it would be well, in the 



2o8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

training of naval officers in future, to combine a college 
education with a shorter intensive technical course at the 
Naval Academy. For these college men have what technical 
academies do not usually succeed in giving — a general educa- 
tion and a general training, which develops the power of 
initiative, independent thought, an ability quickly to grasp 
intricate situations, and to master, in a short time, almost 
any practical problem. At least this proved to be the case 
with our subchaser forces. So little experience did these 
boys have of seafaring that, as soon as they had completed 
their first voyage, we had to place a considerable portion in 
hospital to recover from seasickness. Yet, a few months 
afterward, we could leave these same men on the bridge at 
night in command of the ship. When they reached New 
London they knew no more of seamanship and navigation 
than so many babies, but so well were these boys instructed 
and trained within a few weeks by the regular officers in 
charge that they learned their business sufficiently well to 
cross the Atlantic safely in convoy. The early 8o-foot sub- 
chasers which we built for Great Britain and France crossed 
the ocean on the decks of ocean liners ; for it would have been 
a waste of time, even if international law had permitted it, 
to send them under their own power; but all of the no- 
footers which these young men commanded crossed the 
ocean under their own power and many in the face of the 
fierce January and February gales, almost constantly tossed 
upon the waves like pieces of cork. As soon as they were 
sufficiently trained and prepared to make the trip, groups 
were despatched under escort of a naval vessel fitted to supply 
them with gasolene at sea. Such matters as gunnery these 
young men also learned with lightning speed. The most 
valuable were those who had specialized in mathematics, 
chemistry, and general science; but they were all a splendid 
lot, and to their spirit and energy are chiefly due their re- 
markable success in learning their various duties. 

"Those boys can't bring a ship across the ocean!" someone 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 209 

remarked to Captain Cotten, who commanded the first 
squadron of subchasers to arrive at Plymouth, after he had 
related the story of one of these voyages. 

"Perhaps they can't," replied Captain Cotten — himself 
an Annapolis man who admires these reservists as much as 
I do. " But they have." 

And he pointed to thirty-six little vessels lying at anchor 
in Plymouth Harbor, just about a hundred yards from the 




WHERE THE SUBCHASERS WENT 
These tiny men-of-war did not have fuel capacity enough for the trip across the 
Atlantic, so their course lay via Bermuda and the Azores. Even between those 
islands they had to take on fuel from their mother ships. When on duty they oper- 
ated in the Mediterranean, the Adriatic, the EngHsh Channel, off Queenstown 
and Brest, and one flotilla rounded North Cape for duty on the Murmansk Coast. 



monument which marks the spot from which the Mayflower 
sailed for the new world — all of which were navigated across 
by youngsters of whom almost none, officers or men, had 
had any nautical training until the day the United States 
declared war on Germany. 

Capable as they were, however, I am sure that these re- 
servists would be the first to acknowledge their obligations 



2IO THE VICTORY AT SEA 

to the loyal and devoted regular officers of the Navy, who 
labored so diligently to train them for their work. One of 
the minor tragedies of the war is that many of our Annapolis 
men, whose highest ambition it was to cross the ocean and 
engage in the "game," had to stay on this side, in order to 
instruct these young men from civil life. 

I wish that I had the space adequately to acknowledge the 
work in organization done by Captain John T. Tompkins; 
in listening devices by Rear-Admiral S. S. Robison, Captains 
Frank H. Schofield, Joseph H. Defrees, Commanders Clyde 
S. McDowell, and Miles A. Libbey, and the many scientists 
who gave us the benefit of their knowledge and experience. 
It is impossible to overpraise the work of such men as Cap- 
tains Arthur J. Hepburn, Lyman A. Cotten, and William P. 
Cronan, in "licking" the splendid raw material into shape. 
Great credit is also due to Rear-Admiral T. P. Magruder, 
Captains David F. Boyd, S. V. Graham, Arthur Crenshaw, 
E. P. Jessop, C. M. Tozer, H. G. Sparrow, and C. P. Nelson, 
and many others who had the actual responsibility of con- 
voying these vessels across the ocean. 

I assume that they will receive full credit when the story 
of the work of the Navy at home is written ; meanwhile, they 
may be assured of the appreciation of those of us on the other 
side who depended so much for success upon their thorough 
work of preparation. 

II 

THE sea qualities which the subchaser displayed, and the 
development of listening devices which made it possible 
to detect all kinds of sounds under water at a considerable 
distance, immediately laid before us the possibility of direct 
offensive operations against the submarine. It became ap- 
parent that these listening devices could be used to the great- 
est advantage on these little craft. The tactics which were 
soon developed for their use made it necessary that we should 
have a large number of vessels; nearly all the destroyers were 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 211 

then engaged in convoy duty and we could not entertain the 
idea of detailing many of them for this more or less experi- 
mental work. Happily the subchasers started coming off 
the ways just in time to fill the need; and the several Allied 
navies began competing for these new craft in lively fashion. 
France demanded them in large numbers to work in coopera- 
tion with their air stations and also to patrol her coastal 
waters, and there were many requests from stations in Eng- 
land, Ireland, Gibraltar, Portugal, and Italy. The question 
of where we should place them was therefore referred to the 
Allied Naval War Council, which, at my suggestion, consid- 
ered the matter, not from the -standpoint of the individual 
nation, but from the standpoint of the Allied cause as a 
whole. 

A general survey clearly showed that there were three 
places where the subchasers might render the most efficient 
service. The convoy system had by this time not only 
greatly reduced the losses, but it was changing the policy of 
the submarines. Until this system was adopted, sinkings 
on a great scale were taking place far out at sea, sometimes 
three or four hundred miles west of Ireland. The submarines 
had adopted the policy of meeting the unescorted ships in the 
Atlantic and of torpedoing them long before they could reach 
the zones where the destroyer patrol might possibly have 
protected them. But sailing great groups of merchantmen 
in convoys, surrounded by destroyers, made this an unprofit- 
able adventure, and the submarines therefore had to change 
their programme. The important point is that the convoys, 
so long as they could keep formation, and so long as protect- 
ing screens could be maintained on their flanks, were virtually 
safe. Under these conditions sinkings, as already said, were 
less than one half of i per cent. These convoys, it will be 
recalled, came home by way of two "trunk lines," a southern 
one extending through the English Channel and a northern 
one through the so-called " North Channel " — the latter being 
the passage between Ireland and Scotland. As soon as the 



212 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

inward-bound southern "trunk-line" convoys reached the Eng- 
lish Channel they broke up, certain ships going to Plymouth, 
Portsmouth, Southampton, and other Channel ports, and 
others sailing to Brest, Cherbourg, Havre, and other harbors 
in France. In the same fashion, convoys which came in by 
way of the North Channel split up as soon as they reached 
the Irish Sea. In other words, the convoys, as convoys, 
necessarily ceased to exist the moment that they entered 
these inland waters, and the ships, as individual ships, or 
small groups of ships, had to find their way to their destina- 
tions unescorted by destroyers, or escorted most inadequately. 
This was the one weak spot in the convoy system, and the 
Germans were not slow to turn it to their advantage. They 
now proceeded to withdraw most of their submarines from 
the high seas and to concentrate them in these restricted 
waters. In April, 191 7, the month which marked the high 
tide of German success, not far from a hundred merchant 
ships were sunk in an area that extended about 300 miles 
west of Ireland and about 300 miles south. A year after- 
ward — in the month of April, 19 18 — not a single ship was 
sent to the bottom in this same section of the sea. That 
change measures the extent to which the convoy saved 
Allied shipping. But if we examine the situation in in- 
closed waters — the North Channel, the Irish Sea, St. George's 
Channel, and the English Channel — we shall find a less 
favorable state of affairs. Practically all the sinkings of 
April, 1 9 18, occurred in these latter areas. In April, 191 7, 
the waters which lay between Ireland and England were prac- 
tically free from depredations; in the spring of 19 18, however, 
these waters had become a favorite hunting ground for sub- 
marines; while in the English Channel the sinkings were 
almost as numerous in April, 19 18, as they had been in the 
same month the year before.* 

Thus we had to deal with an entirely new phase of the sub- 
marine campaign; the new conditions made it practicable to 

*These facts are graphically shown in the diagrams published on pages 12-13. 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 213 

employ light vessels which existed in large numbers, and 
which could aggressively hunt out the submarines even 
though they were sailing submerged. The subchaser, when 
fitted with its listening devices, met these new requirements, 
though of course not to the desirable degree of precision we 
hoped soon to attain with still further improved hydrophones 
and larger vessels of the Eagle class then being built. 

The matter was presented to the Allied Naval Council 
and, in accordance with the unanimous opinion of all of the 
members, they recommended that of the subchasers then 
available a squadron should be based on Plymouth, where 
it could be advantageously used against the German sub- 
marines which were still doing great damage in the English 
Channel, and that another squadron, based on Queenstown, 
should similarly be used against the submarines in the Irish 
Sea. 

I was therefore requested to concentrate the boats at these 
two points, and at once acquiesced in this recommendation. 

But another point, widely separated from British waters, 
also made a powerful plea for consideration. In the Medi- 
terranean the submarine campaign was still a menace. 
The spring and early summer of 19 18 witnessed large losses 
of shipping destined to southern France, to Italy, and to 
the armies at Saloniki and in Palestine. Austrian and Ger- 
man submarines, operating from their bases at Pola and 
Cattaro in the Adriatic, were responsible for this destruction. 
If we could pen these pests in the Adriatic, the whole Medi- 
terranean Sea would become an unobstructed highway for the 
Allies. A glance at the map indicated the way in which such 
a desirable result might be accomplished. At its southern 
extremity the Adriatic narrows to a passage only forty miles 
wide — the Strait of Otranto — and through this restricted 
area all the submarines were obliged to pass before they could 
reach the waters where they could prey upon Allied com- 
merce. For some time before the Allied Naval Council be 
gan to consider the use of the American subchasers, the Brit^ 



214 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

ish navy was doing its best to keep submarines from passing 
this point. A defensive scheme known, not very accurately, 
as the "Otranto barrage," was in operation. The word 
"barrage" suggests an effective barrier, but this one at the 
base of the Adriatic consisted merely of a few British de- 
stroyers of ancient type and a large number of drifters, which 
kept up a continuous patrolling of the gateway through which 
the submarines made their way into the Mediterranean. It 
is no reflection upon the British to say that this barrage was 
unsatisfactory and inadequate, and that, for the first few 
months, it formed a not particularly formidable obstruction. 
So many demands were made upon the British navy in north- 
ern waters that it could not spare many vessels for this work; 
the Italian navy was holding the majority of its destroyers 
intact, momentarily prepared for a sortie by the Austrian 
battle fleet; the Otranto barrage, therefore, important as it 
was to the Allied cause, was necessarily insufficient. The 
Italian representatives at the Allied Council made a strong 
plea for a contingent of American subchasers to reinforce the 
British ships, and the British and French delegates seconded 
this request. 

In the spring of 19 18 I therefore sent Captain Leigh to 
southern Italy to locate and construct a subchaser base in 
this neighborhood. After inspecting the territory in detail 
Captain Leigh decided that the Bay of Govino, in the Island 
of Corfu, would best meet our requirements. The imme- 
diate connection which was thus established between New 
London and this ancient city of classical Greece fairly illus- 
trates how widely the Great War had extended the horizon 
of the American people. There was a certain appropriate- 
ness in the fact that the American college boys who com- 
manded these little ships — not much larger than the vessel 
in which Ulysses had sailed these same waters three thousand 
years before — should have made their base on the same island 
which had served as a naval station for Athens in the Pelo- 
ponnesian War, and which, several centuries afterward, had 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 215 

been used for the same purpose by Augustus in the struggle 
with Antony. And probably the sight of the Achelleion, 
the Kaiser's palace, which was not far from this new Ameri- 
can base, was not without its influence in constantly remind- 
ing our young men of the meaning of this unexpected asso- 
ciation of Yankee-land with the ancient world. 

Ill 

BY JUNE 30, 19 18, two squadrons of American chasers, 
comprising thirty-six boats, had assembled at Ply- 
mouth, England, under the command of Captain Lyman 
A, Cotten, U. S. N. The U. S. destroyer Parker, commanded 
by Commander Wilson Brown, had been assigned to this 
detachment as a supporting ship. The area which now 
formed the new field of operations was one which was causing 
great anxiety at that time. It comprehended that section 
of the Channel which reached from Start Point to Lizard 
Head, and included such important shipping ports as Ply- 
mouth, Devonport, and Falmouth. This was the region in 
which the convoys, after having been escorted through the 
submarine zone, were broken up, and from which the individ- 
ual ships were obliged to fmd their way to their destinations 
with greatly diminished protection. It was one of the most 
important sections in which the Germans, forced to abandon 
their submarine campaign on the high seas, were now actively 
concentrating their efforts. Until the arrival of the sub- 
chasers sinkings had been taking place in these waters on a 
considerable scale. In company with a number of British 
hunting units. Captain Cotten's detachment kept steadily 
at work from June 30th until the middle of August, when 
it became necessary to send it elsewhere. The historical 
fact is that not a single merchant ship was sunk between 
Lizard Head and Start Point as long as these subchasers 
were assisting in the operations. The one sinking which at 
first seemed to have broken this splendid record was that of 
the Stockforce; this merchantman was destroyed off Dart- 



2i6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

mouth; but it was presently announced that the Siockforce 
was in reality a "mystery" ship, sent out for the express 
purpose of being torpedoed, and that she "got" the subma- 
rine which had ended her own career. This happening there- 
fore hardly detracted from our general satisfaction over the 
work done by our little vessels. Since many ships had been 
sunk in this area in the month before they arrived, and since 
the sinkings started in again after they had left, the im- 
munity which this region enjoyed during July and August 
may properly be attributed largely to the American navy. 
Not only were no bona-fide merchant ships destroyed, but 
no mines were laid from Start Point to Lizard Head during 
the time that the American forces maintained their vigil 
there. That this again was probably not a mere coincidence 
was shown by the fact that, the very night after these chasers 
were withdrawn from Plymouth, five mines were laid in 
front of that harbor, in preparation for a large convoy 
scheduled to sail the next day. 

By the time that Captain Cotten's squadron began work 
the hunting tactics which had been developed during their 
training at New London had been considerably improved. 
Their procedure represented something entirely new in naval 
warfare. Since the chasers had to depend for the detection 
of the foe upon an agency so uncertain as the human ear, it 
was thought to be necessary, as a safe guard against error, 
and also to increase the chances of successful attack, that 
they should hunt in groups of at least three. The fight 
against the submarine, under this new system, was divided 
into three parts — the search, the pursuit, and the attack. 
The first chapter included those weary hours which the little 
group spent drifting on the ocean, the lookout in the crow's 
nest scanning the surface for the possible glimpse of a peri- 
scope, while the trained listeners on deck, with strange 
little instruments which somewhat resembled telephone 
receivers glued to their ears, kept constantly at tension for 
any noise which might manifest itself under water. It was 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 217 

impossible to use these listening devices while the boats 
were under way, for the sound of their own propellers and 
machinery would drown out any other disturbances. The 
three little vessels therefore drifted abreast — at a distance 
of a mile or two apart — their propellers hardly moving, and 
the decks as silent as the grave; they formed a new kind of 
fishing expedition, the officers and crews constantly held 
taut by the expectation of a "bite." And frequently 
their experience was that of the proverbial "fisherman's 
luck." Hours passed sometimes without even the encour- 
agement of a "nibble"; then, suddenly, one of the listeners 
would hear something which his experienced ear had learned 
to identify as the propellers and motors of a submarine. The 
great advantage possessed by the American tubes, as al- 
ready said, was that they gave not only the sound, but its 
direction. The listener would inform his commanding offi- 
cer that he had picked up a submarine. "Very faint," he 
would perhaps report, "direction 97" — the latter being the 
angle which it made with the north and south line. Another 
appliance which now rendered great service was the wireless 
telephone. The commanding officer at once began talking 
with the other two boats, asking if they had picked up the 
noise. Unless all three vessels had heard the disturbance, 
nothing was done; but if all identified it nearly simultane- 
ously, this unanimity was taken as evidence that something 
was really moving in the water. When all three vessels 
obtained the direction as well as the sound it was a com- 
paratively simple matter to define pretty accurately its loca- 
tion. The middle chaser of the three was the flagship and 
her most interesting feature was the so-called plotting room. 
Here one officer received constant telephone reports from all 
three boats, giving the nature of the sounds, and, more 
important still, their directions. He transferred these 
records to a chart as soon as they came in, rapidly made 
calculations, and in a few seconds he was able to give the 
location of the submarine. This process was known as 



2i8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

obtaining a "fix." The reports of our chaser commanders 
are filled constantly with reference to these "fixes" — the 
"fix" being that point on the surface of the ocean where 
three lines, each giving the direction of the detected sound, 
cross one another. The method can be most satisfactorily 
illustrated by the following diagram : 




HOW THE LISTENING DEVICES LOCATED A 
SUBMARINE 

In this demonstration the letters A, B, and C, each repre- 
sent a subchaser, the central one, B, being the flagship of the 
division. The listener on A has picked up a noise, the 
direction of which is indicated by the line a a. He telephones 
by wireless this information to the plotting room aboard the 
flagship B. The listeners on this vessel have picked up the 
same sound, which comes from the direction indicated by 
the line h b. The point at which these two lines cross is the 
"fix"; it shows the spot in the ocean where the submarine 
was stationed when the sound was first detected. The rea- 
son for having a report from the third subchaser C is merely 
for the purpose of corroborating the work of the other two; 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 219 

if three observations, made independently, agree in locating 
the enemy at this point, the commanding officer may safely 
assume that he is not chasing a will o' the wisp. 

But this "fix" is merely the location of the submarine at 
the time when it was first heard. In the great majority of 
cases, however, the submerged vessel is moving; so, rapidly 
as the men in the plotting room may work, the German 
has advanced beyond this point by the time they have 
finished their calculations. The subchasers, which have 
been drifting while these observations were being made,now 
start their engines at full speed, and rush up to the neigh- 
borhood of their first "fix." Arrived there, they stop 
again, put over their tubes, and begin listening once more. 
The chances are now that the noise of the submarine is 
louder; the chasers are getting "warmer." It is not un- 
likely, however, that the direction has changed, for the 
submarine, which has listening devices of its own — though 
the German hydrophones were decidedly inferior to the 
American — may have heard the subchasers and maybe making 
frantic efforts to elude them. But changing the course will 
help it little, for the listeners easily get the new direction, 
and send the details to the plotting room, where the new 
"fix" is obtained in a few moments. Thus the subchasers 
keep inching up to their prey; at each new "fix" the noise 
becomes louder, until the hunters are so near that they feel 
justified in attacking. Putting on full speed, all three rush 
up to the latest "fix," drop depth charges with a lavish 
hand, fire the "Y" howitzers, each one of which carries two 
depth charges, meanwhile manning their guns on the chance 
that the submarine may decide to rise to the surface and give 
battle. In many of these hunts a destroyer accompanies the 
subchasers, always keeping at a considerable distance, so 
that the noise of its propellers will not interfere with the 
game; once the chasers determine the accurate "fix," they 
wire the position to this larger ship, which puts on full steam 
and dashes with the speed of an express train to the indicated 



220 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

spot, and adds ten or a dozen depth charges to those depos- 
ited by the chasers. 

Such were the subchaser tactics in their perfection; yet it 
was only after much experience that the procedure began to 
work with clock-Hke regularity. At first the new world 
under the water proved confusing to the listeners at the 
tubes. This watery domain was something entirely new in 
human experience. When Dr. Alexander Bell invented his 
first telephone an attempt was made to establish a com- 
plete circuit by using the earth itself; the result was that a 
conglomerate of noises — moanings, shriekings, howlings, 
and humming sounds — came over the wire, which seemed to 
have become the playground of a million devils. These 
were the noises, hitherto unknown, which are constantly 
being given out by Mother Earth herself. And now it was 
discovered that the under ocean, which we usually think of 
as a silent place, is in reality extremely vocal. The listeners 
at the C- and K-tubes heard many sounds in addition 
to the ones which they were seeking. On the K-tubes 
a submarine running at full speed was audible from fif- 
teen to twenty miles, but louder noises could be heard 
much farther away. The day might be bright, the water 
quiet, and there might not be a ship anywhere within the 
circle of the horizon, but suddenly the listener at the tube 
would hear a terrific explosion, and he would know that a 
torpedo, perhaps forty or fifty miles distant, had blown up a 
merchantman, or that some merchantman had struck a 
mine. Again he would catch the unmistakable "chug! 
chug! chug!" which he learned to identify as indicating the 
industrious and slow progress of a convoy of twenty or thirty 
ships. Then a rapid humming noise would come along the 
wire; that was the whirling propeller of a destroyer. A faint 
moan caused some bewilderment at first; but it was ultimately 
learned that this came from a wreck, lying at the bottom, 
and tossed from side to side by the current; it sounded like 
the sigh of a ghost, and the frequency with which it was 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 221 

heard told how densely the floor of the ocean was covered 
with victims of the submarines. The larger animal life of 
the sea also registered itself upon the tubes. Our listeners^ 
after a little training, could identify a whale as soon as the 
peculiar noise it made in swimming reached the receivers. 
At first a school of porpoises increased their perplexities. 
The "swish! swish!" which marked their progress so closely 
resembled the noise of a submarine that it used to lead our 
men astray. But practice in this game was everything; 
after a few trips the listener easily distinguished between 
the porpoise and the submarine, though the distinction was 
so fme that he had difficulty in telling just how he made it. 
In fact, our men became so expert that, out of the miscella- 
neous noises which overwhelmed their ears whenever the 
tubes were dropped into the water they were able almost 
invariably to select that of the U-boat. 

In many ingenious ways the chasers supplemented the 
work of other anti-submarine craft. Destroyers and other 
patrol boats kept track of the foe pretty well so long as he 
remained on the surface; the business of the chaser, we must 
remember, was to find him after he had submerged. The 
Commander-in-Chief on shore sometimes sent a radio that 
a German had appeared at an indicated spot, and disap- 
peared beneath the waves; the chasers would then start for 
this location and begin hunting with their listeners. Air- 
craft which sighted submarines would send similar messages; 
convoys that had been attacked, individual ships that had 
been torpedoed, destroyers which had spotted their prey, 
only to lose track of it as soon as it submerged, would call 
upon the chasers to take up the battle where they had 
abandoned it. 

As long as the chasers operated in the waters which I have 
indicated, those between Start Point and Lizard Head, they 
"got" no submarine; the explanation was simple, for as 
soon as the chasers and British hunting vessels became active 
here, the Germans abandoned this field of operations. This 



222 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

was the reason that the operative area of the Plymouth 
detachment was extended. Some of the chasers were now 
sent around Land's End and up the north Cornish coast, 
where colliers bound from Wales to France were proving 
tempting bait for the U-boats; others operated farther out 
to sea, off the Scilly Islands and west of Brest. In these 
regions their contacts with the submarine were quite fre- 
quent. 

There was no U-boat in the German navy which the 
Allied forces were so ambitious to "get" as the U-^^. I 
have already referred to this celebrated vessel and its still 
more celebrated commander, Captain Hans Rose. It was 
this submarine, it will be recalled, which had suddenly paid a 
ceremonious visit to Newport, R, I., in the autumn of 1916, 
and which, on its way back to Germany, had paused long 
enough off Nantucket to sink half a dozen British cargo ships. 
It was the same submarine which sank our own destroyer, the 
Jacoh Jones, by a chance shot with a torpedo. Thus Am- 
ericans had a peculiar reason for wishing to see it driven from 
the seas. About the middle of August, 19 18, we discovered 
that the L^-55 was operating in the Atlantic about 250 miles 
west of Brest. At the same time we learned that two Ger- 
man submarines were coming down the west coast of Ireland. 
We picked up radio messages which these three boats were 
exchanging; this made it quite likely that they proposed to 
form a junction west of Brest, and attack American trans- 
ports, which were then sailing to France in great numbers. 
Here was an opportunity for the subchasers. The distance — 
250 miles to sea — would be a severe strain upon their endur- 
ance, but we assigned four hunting units, twelve boats in all, 
to the task, and also added to this contingent the destroyers 
IVilkes and Parker. On the morning of September 2nd one 
of these subchaser units picked up a suspicious sound. A 
little later the lookout on the Parker detected on the surface 
an object that looked like a conning tower, with an upright 
just forward which seemed to be a mast and sail ; as it was the 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 223 

favorite trick of the U-^3 to disguise itself in this way, it 
seemed certain that the chasers were now on the track of 
this esteemed vessel. When this mast and sail and conning 
tower suddenly disappeared under the water, these suspi- 
cions became still stronger. The Parker put on full speed, 
found an oilslick where the submarine had evidently been 
pumping its bilges, and dropped a barrage of sixteen depth 
charges. But had these injured the submarine? Under 
ordinary conditions there would have been no satisfactory 
answer to this question; but now three little wooden boats 
came up, advanced about 2,000 yards ahead of the Parker, 
stopped their engines, put over their tubes, and began to 
listen. In a few minutes they conveyed the disappointing 
news to the Parker that the depth, charges had gone rather 
wild, that the submarine was still steaming ahead, and that 
they had obtained a "fix" of its position. But the U-^3, 
as always, was exceedingly crafty. It knew that the chasers 
were on the trail; its propellers were revolving so slowly 
that almost no noise was made; the U-boat was stealthily 
trying to throw its pursuers off the scent. For two and a 
half hours the chasers kept up the hunt, now losing the faint 
noise of the U-^^, now again picking it up, now turning in 
one direction, then abruptly in another. Late in the after- 
noon, however, they obtained a "fix," which disclosed the 
welcome fact that the submarine was only about 300 yards 
north of them. In a few minutes four depth charges landed 
on this spot. 

When the waters had quieted the little craft began listen- 
ing. But nothing was heard. For several days afterward 
the radio operators could hear German submarines calling 
across the void to the U-^^, but there was no answer to their 
call. Naturally, we believed that this long-sought enemy 
had been destroyed ; about a week later, however, our radios 
caught a message off the extreme northern coast of Scotland, 
from the U-^^ telling its friends in Germany that it was on its 
way home. That this vessel had been seriously damaged was 



224 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

evident, for it had made no attacks after its experience with 
the subchasers; but it apparently had as many lives as a cat, 
for it was able, in its battered condition, to creep back to 
Germany around the coast of Scotland, a voyage of more 
than a thousand miles. The subchasers, however, at least 
had the satisfaction of having ended the active career of this 
boat. It was damaged two months before the armistice was 
signed, but it never recovered sufficiently from its injuries to 
make another voyage. Yet I must do justice to Captain 
Rose — he did not command the U-^^ on this last voyage. It 
was its only trip during the whole course of the war when he 
had not commanded it ! 

The story of the U-^^ ends with a touch which is char- 
acteristically German. It was one of the submarines which 
were surrendered to the Allies at the signing of the armistice. 
Its first visitors, on this occasion, were the Americans; they 
were eager to read its log-book, and to find out just what had 
happened on this final voyage. The book was on board, and 
it contained a record of the U-^fs voyages from the day 
when it was commissioned up to the day when it was sur- 
rendered. Two or three pages only were missing; the Ger- 
mans had ripped out that part which described the 
encounter with the American subchasers! They were evi- 
dently determined that we should never have the satisfac- 
tion of knowing to just what extent we had damaged the 
boat; this was the only revenge they could take on us. 

IV 

ON THE morning of September 6th three subchaser units, 
under the command of Ensign Ashley D. Adams, 
U. S. N. R. P., were listening at a point about 150 miles west 
of Land's End. At about eleven-thirty two of these units 
detected what was unquestionably the sound of a submarine. 
Moreover, the usual "fixes" disclosed that the enemy was 
close at hand; so close that two of the units ran up and 
dropped their charges. This first attack produced no result 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 225 

on the submarine ; the depth charge from one of the howitzers, 
however, unfortunately landed near one of the chasers, and, 
though it injured no one, it put that particular unit out of 
commission. However, for two hours Ensign Adams's 
division kept closely on the heels of the quarry, now stopping 
to obtain a "fix," now running full speed to catch up with 
the fleeing prey. At one o'clock the plotting room reported 
that the submerged boat was just about a hundred yards 
ahead. The three chasers laid barrages according to 
pattern, and the three "Y" guns shot their depth charges; 
the region of the "fix" was so generously sowed with these 
bombs that it seemed an impossibility that the German could 
have escaped. 

As soon as the tumult quieted down, the chasers put out 
their tubes and listened. For twenty minutes not a sound 
issued from the scene of all this activity. Then a propellor 
was heard faintly turning or attempting to turn. The 
noise this time was not the kind which indicated an 
effort to steal away furtively; it conveyed rather the im- 
pression of difficulty and strain. There was a slight grating 
and squeaking such as might have been made by damaged 
machinery. This noise lasted for a few seconds and then 
ceased. Presently it started up again and then once more it 
stopped. The submarine was making a little progress, but 
fitfully; she would go a few yards and then pause. A slight 
wake now appeared upon the surface, such as a submerged 
U-boat usually left when the water was calm; the listeners at 
the tube were p'leased to note that the location of this dis- 
turbance coincided precisely with their "fix," and thus, in a 
way, confirmed their calculations. One of the subchasers 
promptly ran ahead and began to drop depth charges on this 
wake. There was not the slightest doubt that the surface 
boat was now directly on top of the submarine. After one of 
the depth charges was dropped, a black cylindrical object, 
about thirty inches long, suddenly rose from the depths and 
jumped sixty feet into the air; just what this unexpected 



226 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

visitant was no one seems to know, but that it came from 
the hunted submarine was clear. 

Under such distressing conditions the U-boat had only a 
single chance of saving itself; when the water was suflficiently 
shallow — not deeper than three hundred feet — it could 
safely sink to the bottom and "play dead," hoping that the 
chasers, with their accursed listening devices, would tire of 
the vigil and return to port. A submarine, if in very good 
condition, could remain silently on the bottom for two or 
three days. The listeners on the chaser tubes presently 
heard sounds which suggested that their enemy was perhaps 
resorting to this manceuvre. But there were other noises 
which indicated that possibly this sinking to the bottom was 
not voluntary. The listeners clearly heard a scraping and a 
straining as though the boat was making terrific attempts to 
rise. There was a lumbering noise, such as might be made 
by a heavy object trying to drag its hulk along the muddy 
bottom; this was followed by silence, showing that the 
wounded vessel could advance only a few yards. A terrible 
tragedy was clearly beginning down there in the slime of the 
ocean floor; a boat, with twenty-five or thirty human beings 
on board, was hopelessly caught, with nothing in sight except 
the most lingering death. The listeners on the chasers could 
follow events almost as clearly as though the inside of the 
U-boat could be seen; for every motion the vessel made, 
every effort that the crew put forth to rescue itself from this 
living hell, was registered on the delicate wires which reached 
the ears of the men on the surface. 

Suddenly sharp metallic sounds came up on the wires. 
They were clearly made by hammers beating on the steel 
body of the U-boat. 

"They are trying to make repairs," the listeners reported. 

If our subchasers had had any more depth charges, they 
would have promptly put these wretches out of their misery, 
but they had expended all their ammunition. Darkness was 
now closing in ; our men saw that their vigil was to be a long 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 227 

one; they sent two chasers to Penzance, to get a new supply 
of bombs, and also sent a radio call for a destroyer. The 
spot where the submarine had bottomed was marked by a 
buoy; lanterns were hung out on this buo'y; and two units of 
chasers, six boats in all, prepared to stand guard. At any 
moment, of course, the struggling U-boat might come to the 
surface, and it was necessary to 'have forces near by to fight 
or to accept surrender. All night long the chasers stood by; 
now and then the listeners reported scraping and straining 
noises from below, but these grew fainter and fainter, seeming 
almost to register the despair which must be seizing the 
hearts of the imprisoned Germans. 

At three o'clock in the morning a British destroyer arrived 
and presently the two chasers returned from Penzance with 
more ammunition. Meanwhile, the weather had thickened, 
a fog had fallen, the lights on the buoy had gone out, and the 
buoy itself had been pulled under by the tide. The watching 
subchasers were tossed about by the weather, and lost the 
precise bearing of the sunken submarine. When daylight 
returned and the weather calmed down the chasers again put 
over their tubes and attempted to "fix" the U-boat. They 
listened for hours without hearing a sound; but about five 
o'clock in the afternoon a sharp piercing noise came ringing 
over the wires. It was a sound that made the listeners' 
blood run cold. 

Only one thing in the world could make a sound like that. 
It was the crack of a revolver. The first report had hardly 
stilled when another shot was heard; and then there were 
more in rapid succession. The listeners on two different 
chasers heard these pistol cracks and counted them; the 
reports which these two men independently made agreed in 
every detail. In all, twenty-five shots came from the 
bottom of the sea. As there were from twenty-five to thirty 
men in a submarine crew the meaning was all too evident. 
The larger part of officers and men, finding themselves shut 
tightly in their coffin of steel, had resorted to that escape 



228 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

which was not uncommonly availed of by German sub- 
marine crews in this hideous war. Nearly all of them had 
committed suicide. 



MEANWHILE, our subchaser detachment at Corfu 
was performing excellent service. In these southern 
waters Captain C. P. Nelson commanded two squad- 
rons, comprising thirty-six vessels. Indeed, the American 
navy possessed few officers more energetic, more efficient, 
more lovable, or more personally engaging than Captain 
Nelson. The mere fact that he was known among his 
brother officers as "Juggy Nelson" gives some notion of the 
affection which his personality inspired. This nickname did 
not indicate, as might at first be suspected, that Captain 
Nelson possessed qualities which flew in the face of the pro- 
hibitory regulations of our navy: it was intended, I think, 
as a description of the physical man. For Captain Nelson's 
rotund figure, jocund countenance, and always buoyant 
spirits were priceless assets to our naval forces at Corfu. 
Living conditions there were not of the best; disease was 
rampant among the Serbians, Greeks, and Albanians who 
made up the civil population; there were few opportunities for 
entertainment or relaxation ; it was, therefore, a happy chance 
that the commander was a man whose very presence radiated 
an atmosphere of geniality and enthusiasm. His conversa- 
tional powers for many years had made him a man of mark; 
his story-telling abilities had long delighted naval officers and 
statesmen at Washington; no other selection for commander 
could have been made that would have met with more whole- 
hearted approval from the college boys and other high-type 
civilians who so largely made up our forces in these flotillas. 
At Corfu, indeed, Captain Nelson quickly became a pop- 
ular favorite; his mind was always actively forming plans 
for the discomfiture of the German and Austrian subma- 
rines; and all our Allies were as much impressed with his 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 229 

energy as were our own men. For Captain Nelson was more 
than a humorist and entertainer: he was preeminently a sailor 
of the saltiest type, and he had a real barbaric joy in a fight. 
Even in his official communications to his officers and men 
he invariably referred to the enemy as the "Hun"; the slo- 
gan on which he insisted as the guiding principle of his flotilla 
was "get the Hun before he has a chance to get us." He had 
the supreme gift of firing his subordinates with the same spirit 
that possessed himself; and the vigilance, the constant 
activity, and the courage of the subchasers' crews admirably 
supplemented the sailorlike qualities of the man who com- 
manded them. 

I have already referred to the sea-going abilities of the 
subchasers; but the feat accomplished by those that made 
the trip to Corfu was the most admirable of all. These 
thirty-six boats, little more than motor launches in size, 
sailed from New London to Greece — a distance of 6,000 
miles; and, a day or two after their arrival, they began work 
on the Otranto barrage. Of course they could not have 
made this trip without the assistance of vessels to supply 
them with gasolene, make the necessary routine repairs, care 
for the sick and those suffering from the inevitable minor 
accidents; and it. is greatly to the credit of the naval officers 
who commanded the escorting vessels that they shepherded 
these flotillas across the ocean with practically no losses. On 
their way through the Strait of Gibraltar they made an 
attack on a submarine which so impressed Admiral Niblack 
that he immediately wired London headquarters for a 
squadron to be permanently based on that port. 

As already said, the Otranto Strait was an ideal location 
for this type of anti-submarine craft. It was so narrow — ■ 
about forty miles — that a force of moderate size could keep 
practically all of the critical zone under fairly close obser- 
vation. Above all, the water was so deep — nearly 600 
fathoms (3,600 feet) — that a submarine, once picked up by 
the listening devices, could not escape by the method which 



230 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

was so popular in places where the water was shallow — that 
of sinking to the bottom and resting there until the excite- 
ment was over. On the other hand, this great depth made 
it very difficult to obstruct the passage by a fixed barrier — a 
difficulty that was being rapidly overcome by a certain 
Franco-Italian type of torpedo net. This barrage, after the 
arrival of our chasers, was so reorganized as to make the best 
use of their tactical and listening qualities. The several 
lines of patrolling vessels extended about thirty-five miles; 
there were vessels of several types, the whole making a 
formidable gauntlet, which the submarines had to run before 
they could get from the Adriatic to the Mediterranean. First 
came a line of British destroyers; it was their main duty to 
act as protectors and to keep the barrage from being raided 
by German and Austrian surface ships — a function which 
they fulfilled splendidly. Next came a line of trawlers, then 
drifters, motor launches, and chasers, the whole being 
completed by a line of kite balloon sloops. Practically all 
these vessels, British as well as American, were provided with 
the American devices; and so well did these ingenious 
mechanisms function that it was practically impossible for 
any submarine to pass through the Otranto barrage in calm 
weather without being heard. In fact, it became the regular 
custom for the enemy to wait for stormy weather before 
attempting to slip through this dangerous area, and even 
under these conditions he had great difficulty in avoiding 
detection. 

From July, 19 18, until the day ot the armistice, our 
flotilla at this point kept constantly at work, and the reports 
of our commanders show that their sound contacts with the 
enemy were very frequent. There were battles that un- 
questionably ended in the destruction of the submarines; 
just how much we had accomplished, however, we did not 
know until the Austrians surrendered and our officers, at 
Cattaro and other places, came into touch with officers of the 
Austrian navy. These men, who showed the most friendly 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 231 

disposition toward their American enemies, though they 
displayed the most bitter hostiHty toward their German 
alhes, expressed their admiration for the work of our sub- 
chasers. These little boats, the Austrians now informed us, 
were responsible for a mutiny in the Austrian submarine 
force. Two weeks after their arrival it was impossible to 
compel an Austrian crew to take a vessel through the straits, 
and from that time until the ending of the war not a single 
Austrian submarine ventured upon such a voyage. All the 
submarines that essayed the experiment after this Austrian 
mutiny were German. And the German crews, the Austrian 
officers said, did not enjoy the experience any more than 
their own. There was practically no case in which a sub- 
marine crossed the barrage without being bombed in conse- 
quence; the morale of the German crews steadily went to 
pieces, until, in the last month of the war, their officers were 
obliged to force them into the submarines at the point of a 
pistol. The records showed, the Austrian high officers said, 
that the Germans had lost six submarines on the Otranto 
barrage in the last three months of the war. These figures 
about correspond with the estimates which we had made; 
just how many of these the British sank and just how many 
are to be attributed to our own forces will probably never 
be known, but the fact that American devices were attached to 
all the Allied ships on this duty should be considered in 
properly distributing the credit. 

We have evidence — conclusive even though somewhat 
ludicrous — that the American device on a British destroyer 
"got" one of these submarines. One dark night this vessel, 
equipped with the C-tube, had pursued a submarine and 
bombed it with what seemed to have been satisfactory 
results. However, I have several times called attention to 
one of the most discouraging aspects of anti-submarine war- 
fare: that only in exceptional circumstances did we know 
whether the submarine had been destroyed. This destroyer 
was now diligently searching the area of the battle, the 



232 THEVICTORY AT SEA 

listeners straining every nerve for traces of her foe. For a 
time everything was utterly silent; then, suddenly, the 
listener picked up a disturbance of an unusual kind. The 
noise rapidly became louder, but it was still something very 
different from any noise ever heard before. The C-tube 
consisted of a lead pipe — practically the same as a water 
pipe — which was dropped over the side of the ship fifteen or 
twenty feet into the sea; this pipe contained the wires which, 
at one end, were attached to the devices under the water, 
and which, at the other end, reached the listener's ears. In a 
few seconds this tube showed signs of lively agitation. It 
trembled violently and made a constantly increasing hulla- 
baloo in the ears of the listener. Finally a huge German, 
dripping with water like a sea lion, appeared over the side of 
the destroyer and astounded our British Allies by throwing 
up his arms with "Kamerad!" This visitant from the 
depths was the only survivor of the submarine which it now 
appeared had indubitably been sunk. He had been blown 
through the conning tower, or had miraculously escaped in 
some other way — he did not himself know just what had 
taken place — and while floundering around in the water in 
the inky darkness had, by one of those providences which 
happen so frequently in war time, caught hold of this tube, 
and proceeded to pull himself up hand-over-hand until he 
reached the deck. Had it not been for his escape, the 
British would never have known that they had sunk the 
submarine! 

This survivor, after shaking off the water, sat down and 
became very sociable. He did not seem particularly to dis- 
like the British and Americans, but he was extremely bitter 
against the Italian and Austrians — the first for "deserting" 
the Germans, the latter for proving bad allies. 

"How do you get on with the Italians?" he asked the 
British officer. 

"Very well, indeed," the latter replied, giving a very 
flattering account of their Italian allies. 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 233 

"I guess the Italians are about as useful to you as the 
Austrians are to us," the German sea lion replied. 

In writing to our officers about this episode, the British 
commander said : 

"We have found a new use for your listening devices — 
salvaging drowning Huns." 

VI 

ON SEPTEMBER 28, 1918, Captain Nelson received 
the following communication from the commander of 
the Allied naval forces at Brindisi, Commodore W. A. H. 
Kelly, R.N. : 

"Can you hold twelve chasers ready to leave Corfu to- 
morrow (Sunday) for special service? They should have 
stores for four days. If unavoidable, barrage force may be 
reduced during their absence. Request reply. Further 
definite orders will be sent Sunday afternoon." 

To this Captain Nelson sent an answer which was entirely 
characteristic: 

"Yes." 

The Captain well knew what the enterprise was to which 
this message referred. The proposed undertaking was one 
which was very close to his heart and one which he had 
constantly urged. The Austrian port of Durazzo, on the 
Adriatic, at that time was playing an important part in the 
general conflict. It was a base by which Germany and 
Austria had sent supplies to their ally Bulgaria; and in 
September the Entente had started the campaign against 
Bulgaria which finally ended in the complete humiliation of 
that country. The destruction of Durazzo as a base would 
greatly assist this operation. Several ships lay in the 
harbor; there were many buildings used for army stores; the 
destruction of all these, as well as the docks and military 
works, would render the port useless. The bombardment of 
Durazzo was, therefore, the undertaking for which the as- 
sistance of our subchasers had been requested. It was 



234 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

estimated that about one hour's heavy shelling would render 
this port valueless as an Austrian base; and to accomplish this 
destruction the Italians had detailed three light cruisers, 
the San Giorgio, the Pisa, and the San Marco, and the British 
three light scout cruisers, the Lowestoft, the Dartmouth, 
and the IVeymoutJj. According to the plan agreed upon 
the Italian ships would arrive at Durazzo at about ten o'clock 
on Wednesday morning, October 2d, bombard the works for 
an hour, and then return to Brindisi; when they had finished, 
it was proposed that the British cruisers should take their 
places, bombard for an hour, and likewise retire. The duty 
which had been assigned to the subchasers in this operation 
was an important one. The Austrians had a considerable 
force of submarines at Durazzo; and it was to be expected 
that they would send them to attack the bombarding war- 
ships. The chasers, therefore, were to accompany the 
cruisers, in order to fight any submarine which attempted to 
interfere with the game. "Remember the life of these 
cruisers depends upon your vigilance and activity," said 
Captain Nelson in the instructions issued to the officers who 
commanded the little vessels. 

At nine o'clock that Sunday evening twelve chasers slipped 
through the net at Corfu and started across the Adriatic; 
they sailed "in column," or single file, Captain Nelson head- 
ing the procession in subchaser No. g^, his second in com- 
mand, Lt.-Comdr. Paul H. Bastedo, coming next in chaser 
No. 21^. The tiny fleet hardly suggested to the observer 
anything in the nature of military operations; they looked 
more like a group of motor launches out for a summer cruise. 
The next morning they arrived at Brindisi, the gathering 
place of all the Allied vessels which were to participate in 
the operation — that same Brindisi (or Brundisium) which 
was one of the most famous ports of antiquity, the town from 
which Augustus and Antony, in 42 b. c, started on the 
expedition which, at the battle of Phillipi, was to win them 
the mastery of the ancient world. Upon arriving Captain 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 235 

Nelson went ashore for a council with Commodore Kelly, 
who commanded the British cruisers, and other Allied 
oflficers. When he returned Captain Nelson's face was glow- 
ing with happiness and expectation. 

"It's going to be a real party, boys," he informed his 
subordinate officers. 

Two days were spent at Brindisi, completing preparations; 
on Tuesday evening Captain Nelson called all his oificers 
for a meeting on board the British destroyer. Badger, to give 
them all the details of the forthcoming "party." If there 
had been any flagging spirits in that company when the 
speech began — which I do not believe — all depression had 
vanished when "Juggy" had finished his remarks; every 
officer left with his soul filled by the same joy of approaching 
battle as that which possessed his chief. 

At 2:30 Wednesday morning the chasers left Brindisi, 
steering a straight course to Durazzo. The night was very 
dark; the harbor was black also with the smoke from the 
cruisers and other craft which were making preparations to 
get away. After steaming a few hours the officers obtained 
with their glasses their first glimpse of Durazzo; at this 
time there were no fighting ships in sight except the chasers, 
as the larger ships had not yet arrived. Captain Nelson knew 
that there were two or three Austrian destroyers at Durazzo, 
and his first eff"orts were devoted to attempts to persuade 
them to come out and give battle. With this idea in mind, 
the chasers engaged in what they called a "war dance" 
before the port ; they began turning rapidly in a great circle, 
but all to no purpose, for the Austrian ships declined to ac- 
cept the challenge. After a time the smoke of the Italian 
cruisers appeared above the horizon ; this was the signal for 
the chasers to take their stations. Durazzo is located in an 
indentation of the coast; at the southern extremity of the 
little gulf the land juts out to a point, known as Cape Laghi; 
at the northern extremity the corresponding point is Cape 
Pali; the distance between these two points is about fifteen 



236 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

miles. Two subchaser units, six boats, were assigned as a" 
screen to the ItaHan cruisers while the bombardment was 
under way. One unit, three boats, was stationed at Cape 
Pali, to the north, to prevent any submarines leaving Dur- 
azzo from attacking the British cruisers, which were to ap- 
proach the scene of activities from that quarter, and another 
unit, three boats, was stationed off Cape Laghi. Thus the 
two critical capes were covered against submarine surprises, 
and the attacking vessels themselves were effectively 
screened. 

The Italian cruisers sailed back and forth for about an 
hour, blazing away at Durazzo, destroying shipping in the 
harbor, knocking down military buildings, and devastating 
the place on a liberal scale, all the time screened in this 
operation by our chasers. Meantime, unit B, commanded 
by Lieutenant-Commander Bastedo, had started for its 
station at Cape Pali. The Austrian shore batteries at once 
opened upon the tiny craft, the water in their neighborhood 
being generously churned up by the falling shells. Mean- 
while, the British cruisers, after steaming for a while east, 
turned south in order to take up the bombarding station 
which, according to the arranged programme, the Italian 
warships were about to abandon. The three screening 
chasers were steaming in column, No. i2g, commanded by 
Ensign Maclear Jacoby, U. S. N. R. P., bringing up the 
rear. Suddenly this little boat turned to the right and 
started scampering in the direction of some apparently very 
definite object. It moved so abruptly and hastily that it 
did not take the time even to signal to its associates the 
cause of its unexpected manoeuvre. 

On board No. 21^ there was some question as to what 
should be done. 

"Let's go," said Commander Bastedo. "Perhaps he's 
after a submarine." 

No. 21^ was immediately turned in the direction of the 
busy No. i2g, when the interest of its officers was aroused 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 237 

by a little foamy fountain of spray moving in the water 
slightly forward of its port beam. There was no mystery 
as to the cause of that feathery disturbance. It was made by 
a periscope; it was moving with considerable speed also, 
entirely ignoring the subchasers, and shaping its course 
directly toward the advancing British cruisers. Commander 
Bastedo forgot all about subchaser No. i2g, which apparently 
was after game of its own, and headed his own boat in the 
direction of this little column of spray. In a few seconds 
the periscope itself became visible; Commander Bastedo 
opened fire at it with his port gun; at the second shot a 
column of water and air arose about six feet — a splendid 
geyser which informed the pursuer that the periscope had 
been shattered. By this time the third chaser. No. 128, was 
rushing at full speed. The submarine now saw that all 
chance of attacking the British ships had gone, and turned 
to the south in an effort to get away with a whole skin. 
But the two subchasers, 2/5 and 128, quickly turned again 
and started for their prey; soon both were dropping depth 
charges and shooting their "Y" guns; and a huge circle 
of the sea was a mass of explosions, whirling water, mighty 
eruptions of foam, mist, and debris — and in the mass, steel 
plates and other wreckage flew from the depths into the air. 

"That got him!" cried the executive officer from the deck 
of No. 21^, while the crew lifted up its voices in a shout that 
was reminiscent of a college yell. 

It was not until this moment that Commander Bastedo 
and his associates remembered the i2g, which, when last 
observed, was speeding through the water on an independent 
course of her own. In the midst of the excitement there 
came a message from this boat : 

"Submarine sighted!" 

Then a second afterward came another message. 

"My engines are disabled." 

In a short time Bastedo had reached the boat. 

"Where is the submarine?" 



238 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

"We just sank it," was the answer. No. i2g had dropped 
eight depth charges, one directly over the Austrian boat; in 
the water thrown up the officers had counted seven pieces 
of metal plates, and the masses of oil and bubbles that 
presently arose completed the story of the destruction. 
Meanwhile, the British cruisers had taken up their station 
at Durazzo and were finishing the work that made this place 
useless as a military headquarters. 

Not a man in the whole American force was injured; in a 
brief time the excitement was all over, and the great ships, 
screened again by the wasps of chasers, started back to 
Brindisi. The impression made upon our Allies was well 
expressed in the congratulatory message sent to me in Lon- 
don by Commodore Kelly, who commanded the British 
cruisers in this action. 

"Their conduct," he said, "was beyond praise. They 
all returned safely without casualties. They thoroughly 
enjoyed themselves." 

And from the Italians came this message: 

"Italian Naval General Staff expresses highest apprecia- 
tion of useful and efficient work performed by United States 
chasers in protecting major vessels during action against 
Durazzo; also vivid admiration of their brilliant and clever 
operations which resulted in sinking two enemy submarines." 

The war was now drawing to a close; a day before the 
Allied squadrons started for Durazzo Bulgaria surrendered; 
about two weeks after the attack Austria had given up the 
ghost. The subchasers were about this time just getting 
into their stride; the cessation of hostilities, however, ended 
their careers at the very moment when they had become 
most useful. A squadron of thirty-six under the command 
of Captain A. J. Hepburn reached Queenstown in Sep- 
tember, but though it had several interesting contacts with 
the enemy, and is credited with sending one German home 
badly damaged, the armistice was signed before it had 
really settled down to work. The final spectacular appear- 



COLLEGE BOYS AND SUBCHASERS 239 

ance was at Gibraltar, in the last four days of the war. The 
surrender of Austria had left the German submarines 
stranded in the Adriatic without a base; and they started 
home by way of the Mediterranean and Gibraltar. A 
squadron of eighteen chasers had just arrived at the Azores, 
on the way to reinforce the flotilla at Plymouth; seven of 
these were at once despatched to Gibraltar on the chance 
that they might bar the passage of these U-boats. They 
reached this port at the storm season ; yet they went out in 
the hardest gales and had several exciting contacts with 
the fleeing Germans. The records show that five submarines 
attempted to get through the straits; there is good evidence 
that two of these were sunk, one by the British patrol and 
one by our chasers. 




CHAPTER VII 
THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 

I 

HILE our naval forces were thus playing 
their parts in several areas, the work of cre- 
ating the central staff of a great naval 
organization was going forward in London. 
The headquarters for controlling extensive naval operations 
in many widely dispersed areas, like the headquarters of an 
army extending over a wide front, must necessarily be located 
far behind the scene of battle. Thus, a number of remodeled 
dwelling houses in Grosvenor Gardens contained the main- 
spring for an elaborate mechanism which reached from 
London to Washington and from Queenstown to Corfu. 
On the day of the armistice the American naval forces in 
European waters comprised about 370 vessels of all classes, 
more than five thousand officers, regulars and reserves, and 
more than seventy-five thousand men; we had established 
about forty-five bases and were represented in practically 
every field of naval operations. The widespread activities 
of our London headquarters on that eventful day presented 
a striking contrast to the humble beginnings of eighteen 
months before. 

From April to August, 19 17, the American navy had a 
very small staff organization in Europe. During these 
extremely critical four months the only American naval 
representatives in London, besides the regular Naval At- 
tache and his aides were my personal aide. Commander 
J. V. Babcock, and myself; and our only office in those early 
days was a small room in the American Embassy. For a 

240 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 241 

considerable part of this time we had no stenographers and 
no clerical assistance of our own, though of course the Naval 
Attache, Captain W. D. MacDougall, and his personnel 
gave us all the assistance in their power. Commander 
Babcock had a small typewriter, which he was able to 
work with two fingers, and on this he laboriously pounded 
out the reports which first informed the Navy Department 
of the seriousness of the submarine situation. The fact that 
Commander Babcock was my associate during this critical 
period was a fortunate thing for me, and a still more fortunate 
thing for the United States. Commander Babcock and I 
had been closely associated for several years; in that early 
period, when we, in our two persons, represented the Amer- 
ican naval forces at the seat of Allied naval activity, we not 
only worked together in that little room but we lived to- 
gether. Our office was alternately this room in the American 
Embassy and our quarters in a hotel. I had already noted 
Commander Babcock's abilities when he was on my staff in 
the Atlantic Torpedo Flotilla and when he was a student 
at the Naval War College; but our constant companionship 
throughout the war, especially during these first few strenu- 
ous months in London, gave me a still greater respect for 
his qualities. Many men have made vital contributions 
to our success in the war of whom the public scarcely ever 
hears even the name. A large part of the initiative and 
thinking which find expression in successful military action 
originates with officers of this type. They labor day after 
day and night after night, usually in subordinate positions, 
unselfishly doing work which is necessarily credited to 
other names than their own, daily lightening the burden of 
their chiefs, and constantly making suggestions which may 
control military operations or afi"ect national policy. Com- 
mander Babcock is a striking representative of this type. 
My personal obligations to him are incalculable; and I am 
indebted to him not only for his definite services, but for the 
sympathy, the encouragement, and the kindly and calculated 



242 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

pessimism which served so well to counterbalance my tem- 
peramental optimism. 

Our relations were so close, working and living together 
as we did, that I fmd it difficult to speak of "Babby's" ser- 
vices with restraint. But there are particular accomplish- 
ments to his credit which should go down upon this popular 
record. I have described the first consultations with the 
British naval chiefs. These were the meetings which formed 
the basis of the reports recommending the conditions upon 
which the American navy should cooperate with the Allies. 
Commander Babcock was constantly at my elbow during 
all these consultations, and was all the time independently 
conducting investigations in the several departments of the 
Admiralty. The original drafts of all my written and cabled 
communications to the Department — reports which form 
a connected story of our participation in the naval war during 
this period — were prepared by him. 

Able as Commander Babcock was, human endurance still 
had its limitations. A public-spirited American business 
man in London, Mr. R. E. Gillmor, who had formerly been 
an officer in the navy, begged to be accepted as a volunteer; 
he brought two of his best stenographers, English girls, and 
personally paid their salaries for several weeks while they 
were devoting all their time to the American navy. Sub- 
sequently he was enlisted in the naval reserves and performed 
very valuable services on the staff throughout nearly the 
entire period of the war — until ordered to America, where 
his technical knowledge was required in connection with 
certain important appliances with which he was familiar. 
His experience as a business man in London was of great 
value to our forces, and his time and energy were devoted 
to our service with a zeal and loyalty that endeared him to 
us all. 

Soon afterward a number of Rhodes scholars and other 
young Americans then in Europe, G. B. Stockton, E. H. 
McCormick, T. B. Kittredge, P. F. Good, R. M. D. Rich- 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 243 

ardson, H. Millard, L. S. Stevens, and J. C. Baillargeon, 
joined our forces as unpaid volunteers and gave us the benefit 
of their trained minds and European experience. Two of 
these, Kittredge and Stockton, both valuable workers, had 
been serving under Hoover in Belgium. They were all 
later enrolled as reserves and continued their work through- 
out the war. Lieutenant Stockton performed the ardu- 
ous and important duties of chief business manager, or 
executive officer, of headquarters in a most efficient 
manner, and throughout the war Kittredge's previous his- 
torical training, European experience, and fine intellectual 
gifts made his services very valuable in the Intelligence 
Department. 

Mr. Page, the American Ambassador, aided and encour- 
aged us in all possible ways. Immediately after my arrival 
in London he invited me to call upon him and his staff for 
any assistance they could render. In his enthusiastic and 
warm-hearted way, he said, " Everything we have is yours. 
I will turn the Embassy into the street if necessary"; and 
throughout the war he was a tower of strength to the cause. 
He gave us his time and the benefit of his great experience 
and personal prestige in establishing cordial relations with 
the various branches of the British Government — and all 
this with such an absence of diplomatic formality, 
such courteous and forceful eificiency, and such cordial 
sympathy and genuine kindness that he immediately ex- 
cited not only our sincere admiration but also our personal 
affection. 

During all this period events of the utmost importance 
were taking place; it was within these four months that the 
convoy system was adopted, that armed guards were placed 
on merchant ships, that the first American troops were 
escorted to France, and that our destroyers and other war- 
ships began arriving in European waters. In July it became 
apparent that the strain of doing the work of a dozen men, 
which had been continuous during the past four months, 



244 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

could no longer be supported by my aide, Commander Bab- 
cock. When the destroyers and other ships arrived, we went 
through their lists; here and there we hit upon a man whom 
we regarded as qualified for responsible staff duty, and 
transferred him to the London headquarters. This pro- 
ceeding was necessary if our essential administrative work 
was to be done. Among the reserves who were subsequently 
assigned to our forces many excellent staff officers also were 
developed for handling the work of communications, cipher 
codes, and the like. When the Colonel House Commission 
came over in October, 19 17, I explained our necessities to 
the "skippers" of the two cruisers that brought the party, 
who promptly gave us all the desks and office equipment 
they could spare and sent them to Grosvenor Gardens. 

In August, however, additional ships and forces began to 
arrive from America, and it became necessary to have larger 
quarters than those available in the Embassy for handling 
the increasing administrative work. At one time the British 
Government contemplated building us a temporary struc- 
ture near the Admiralty, but this was abandoned because 
there was a shortage of material. We therefore moved into 
an unoccupied dwelling near the American Embassy that 
seemed adapted to our needs. We rented this house furn- 
ished, just as it stood; a first glimpse of it, however, sug- 
gested refined domesticity rather than naval operations. We 
quickly cleared the building of rugs, tapestries, lace curtains, 
pictures, and expensive furniture, reduced the twenty-five 
rooms to their original bareness, and filled every corner with 
office equipment. In a few days the staff was installed in this 
five-story residence and the place was humming with the 
noise of typewriters. At first we regarded the leasing of this 
building as something of an extravagance; it seemed hardly 
likely that we should ever use it all! But in a few weeks 
we had taken the house adjoining, cut holes through the 
walls and put in doors; and this, too, was filled up in an in- 
credibly short time, so rapidly did the administrative work 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 245 

grow. Ultimately we had to take over six of these private 
residences and make alterations which transformed them 
into one. From August our staff increased at a rapid rate 
until, on the day the armistice was signed, we had not far 
from 1 ,200 officers, enlisted men, and clerical force, working 
in our London establishment, the commissioned staff con- 
sisting of about 200 officers of which sixty were regulars and 
the remainder reserves. 

I find that many people are surprised that I had my 
headquarters in London. The historic conception of the 
commander-in-chief of a naval force located on the quarter- 
deck of his flagship still holds the popular imagination. But 
controlling the operations of extensive and widely dispersed 
forces in a campaign of this kind is quite a different pro- 
ceeding from that of directing the naval compaigns of 
Nelson's time, just as making war on land has changed 
somewhat from the method in vogue with Napoleon. The 
opinion generally prevails that my principal task was to 
command in person certain naval forces afloat. The fact 
is that this was really no part of my job during the war. The 
game in which several great nations were engaged for four 
years was a game involving organized direction and co- 
operation. It is improbable that any one nation could have 
won the naval war; that was a task which demanded not 
only that we should all exert our fullest energies, but that, 
so far as it was humanly possible, we should exert them as a 
unit. It was the duty of the United States above all nations 
to manifest this spirit. We had entered the war late; we 
had entered it in a condition of unpreparedness; our naval 
forces, when compared to those which had been assembled 
by the Allies, were small; we had not been engaged for three 
years combating an enemy using new weapons and methods 
of naval warfare. It was not unlikely that we could make 
some original contributions to the Allied effort; indeed, we 
early did so; yet it was natural to suppose that the navies 
which had been combatting the submarines so long under- 



246 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

stood that game better than did we, and it was our duty to 
assist them in this work, rather than to operate independ- 
ently. Moreover, this question as to whether any particular 
one of our methods might be better or might be worse than 
Great Britain's was not the most important one. The point 
was that the British navy had developed its own methods of 
working and that it was a great "going concern." The 
crisis was so pressing that we simply did not have the time 
to create a separate force of our own; the most cursory 
examination of conditions convinced me that we could hope 
to accomplish something worth while only by playing the 
game as it was then being played, and that any attempt 
to lay down new rules would inevitably decrease the 
effectiveness of our cooperation, and perhaps result in losing 
the war. We can even admit, for the sake of the argument, 
that the Americans might have created a better organization 
than the British; but the question of improving on their 
methods, or of not improving on them, was a point that was 
not worth considering; long before we could have developed 
an efficient independent machine the war would have come 
to an end. It was thus our duty to take things as they were, 
to plunge immediately into the conflict, and to make every 
ship and every man tell in the most effective way and in the 
shortest possible time. Therefore I decided that our forces 
should become, for the purpose of this war, virtually a part 
of the Allied navies; to place at the disposal of the Allies 
our ships to reinforce the weak part of their lines ; to ignore 
such secondary considerations as national pride, naval pres- 
tige, and personal ambitions; and to subordinate every other 
consideration to that of defeating the Hun. I have already 
described how in distributing our subchasers I practically 
placed them at the disposal of the Allied Council; and 
this represents the policy that was followed in all similar 
matters. 

The naval high commands were located at Washington, 
London, Paris, and Rome. Necessarily London was the 




■g {2 «°w *^ 

S S c ^ g 

£• -* g ° - '^ 

£ 5 tr *= ^ c 

•c S § 2 o E 

e. z a. »»• u. «c 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 247 

headquarters of the naval war. Events which had long 
preceded the European conflict had made this choice in- 
evitable. The maritime development of four centuries had 
prepared London for the role which she was now called upon 
to play. From all over the world naval and maritime in- 
formation flowed to this great capital as though in obe- 
dience to the law of gravity. Even in peace times London 
knew where every ship in the world was at any particular 
time. All other machinery for handling this great mass of de- 
tail was necessarily accumulated in this great city, and Lloyds, 
the world headquarters for merchant shipping, had now be- 
come practically a part of the British Admiralty. In this 
war the matter of information and communications was 
supremely important. Every decision that was made and 
every order that was issued, even those that were the least 
consequential, rested upon complete information which was 
obtainable, in time to be useful, only in London. 1 could not 
have made my headquarters in Washington, or Paris, or 
Rome because these cities could not have furnished the 
military intelligence which was needed as a preliminary to 
every act. For the same reason I could not have efficiently 
controlled the operations of all our forces from Queenstown, 
or Brest, or Gibraltar; the staff controlHng the whole had 
necessarily to be located in London, and the tactical com- 
mands at these other bases must be exercised by subor- 
dinates. The British placed all their sources of information 
and their communications at our disposal. They literally 
opened their doors and made us part of their organization. 
I sat daily in consultation with British naval chiefs, and our 
officers had access to all essential British information just as 
freely as did the British naval officers themselves. On the 
day of my arrival Admiral Jellicoe issued orders that the 
Americans should be shown anything which they wished to 
see. With all this information, the most complete and 
detailed in the world, constantly placed at our disposal, and 
a spirit of confidence and friendship always prevailing which 



248 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

has no parallel in history, it would have defeated the whole 
purpose of our participation in the war had the American 
high command taken up its headquarters anywhere except 
in London. 

Incidentally, there was an atmosphere in the London Ad- 
miralty which made a strong appeal to any one who is in- 
terested in naval history. Everything about the place is 
reminiscent of great naval achievements. The room in 
which our councils met was the same old Admiralty Board 
room that had been used for centuries. In accordance with 
the spirit of British conservatism, this room is almost 
exactly the same now, even in its furnishings, as it was in 
Nelson's time. The same old wood carvings hang over the 
same old fireplace; the table at which we sat is the identical 
one at which Nelson must have sat many times, and the very 
silver inkstand which Nelson used was used by his successors 
in this war. The portrait of this great naval chieftain looked 
down upon us during our deliberations. Above the fireplace 
is painted a huge compass, and about the centre of this 
swings an arrow. This was a part of the Admiralty equip- 
ment of a hundred years ago, though it has no usefulness now 
except a sentimental one. In old days this arrow was 
geared to a weather vane on the roof of the Admiralty, and it 
constantly showed to the chiefs assembled in the council 
room the direction of the wind — a matter of great importance 
in the days of sailing ships. 

All general orders and plans concerning the naval opera- 
tions of British and American forces came from the Ad- 
miralty, and here officers of my staff were constantly at 
work. The commanders-in-chief at the various bases com- 
manded the combined British and American ships based 
on those ports only in the sense that they carried out the 
general instructions and policies which were formulated in 
London. These orders, so far as they affected American 
forces, could be issued to the commanders-in-chief only after 
American headquarters in London had vised them. Thus 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 249 

the American staff held the ultimate command over all the 
American forces which were based in British waters. The 
same was true of those at Brest, Gibraltar, and other sta- 
tions. The commanders-in-chief executed them, and were 
responsible for the manner in which the forces were used in 
combating the enemy. The operations of which I was the 
commander extended over an immense area. The Ply- 
mouth and Queenstown forces represented only a part of the 
ultimate American naval strength in European waters and 
not the most important part; before the war ended, Brest, as 
I shall show, developed into a greater naval base than any of 
those which we maintained in the British Isles. Convoys 
were not only coming across the Atlantic but they were 
constantly arriving from the Mediterranean and from the 
South Sea, and it was the duty of headquarters in Lon- 
don, and not the duty of local commanders, to rout these 
precious argosies, except in special cases, just before they 
reached their port of destination. Not infrequently, as 
previously described, it was necessary to change destina- 
tions, or to slow down convoys, or to make any number of 
decisions based on new information; naturally only the centre 
of information, the Admiralty convoy room, could serve as a 
clearing house for such operations. The point is that it was 
necessary for me to exercise the chief command of American 
forces through subordinates. My position in this respect 
was precisely the same as that of Generals Haig and Pershing; 
I had to maintain a great headquarters in the rear, and 
to depend upon subordinates for the actual execution of 
orders. 

The American headquarters in London comprised many 
separate departments, each one of which was directly respon- 
sible to me as the Force Commander, through the Chief of 
Staff; they included such indispensable branches as the 
office of the Chief of Staff, Captain N. C. Twining, Chief of 
Staff; Assistant Chief of Staff, Captain W. R. Sexton; In- 
telligence Department, Commander J. V. Babcock, who also 



250 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

acted as Aide; Convoy Operations Section, Captain Byron A. 
Long; Anti-submarine Section, Captain R. H. Leigh ; Aviation 
Section, Captain H. L Cone, and afterward, Lieutenant-Com- 
mander W. A. Edwards ; Personnel Section, Commander H . R. 
Stark; Communication Section, Lieutenant-Commander E. 
G. Blakeslee; Materiel Section, Captain E.C.Tobey (S. C); 
Repair Section, Captain S. F.Smith (C. C), and afterward. 
Naval Constructor L. B. McBride (C. C); Ordnance Section, 
Commander G. L. Schuyler, and afterward. Commander T. 
A. Thomson; Medical Section, Captain F. L. Pleadwell 
(M . C), and afterward, Commander Edgar Thompson (M. C.) ; 
Legal Section, Commander W. H. McGrann; and the Scien- 
tific Section, Professor H. A. Bumstead, Ph. D. 

I was fortunate in all of my departmental chiefs. The 
Chief of Staff, Captain N. C. Twining, would certainly have 
been a marked man in any navy; he had a genius for detail, a 
tireless energy, and a mastery of all the problems that 
constantly arose. I used to wonder when Captain Twining 
ever found an opportunity to sleep; he seemed to be working 
every hour of the day and night; yet, so far as was observ- 
able, he never wearied of his task, and never slackened in his 
devotion to the Allied cause. As soon as a matter came up 
that called for definite decision. Captain Twining would as- 
semble from the several departments all data and informa- 
tion which were available concerning the question at issue, 
spend a few hours studying this information, and then give 
his judgment — an opinion which was invariably sound and 
which was adopted in the vast majority of cases; in 
fact, in all cases except those in which questions of policy 
or extraneous considerations dictated a different or modi- 
fied decision. Captain Twining was a man of really fine in- 
tellect combined with a remarkable capacity for getting things 
done; without his constant presence at my elbow, my work 
would have been much heavier and much less successful than 
it was. He is an officer of such exceptional ability, such 
matured experience, and such forceful character as to assure 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 251 

him a brilliant career in whatever duty he may be called upon 
to perform. I can never be sufficiently grateful to him for 
his loyalty and devotion and for his indispensable contribu- 
tion to the efficiency of the forces I had the honor to com- 
mand. 

In accordance with my habitual practice, I applied the 
system of placing responsibility upon my carefully selected 
heads of departments, giving them commensurate authority, 
and holding them to account for results. Because the task 
was such a great one, this was the only possible way in 
which the operations of the force could have been successfully 
conducted. I say, successfully conducted, because in a 
"business" of this kind, "good enough" and "to-morrow" 
may mean disaster; that is, it is a case of keeping both in- 
formation and operations up to the minute. If the per- 
sonnel and equipment of the staff are not completely capable 
of this, it is more than a partial failure, and the result is an 
ever-present danger. There were men in this great war who 
"went to pieces" simply because they tried to do everything 
themselves. This administrative vice of attempting to con- 
trol every detail, even insignificant ones, to which military 
men seem particularly addicted, it had always been my policy 
to avoid. Business at Grosvenor Gardens developed to such 
an extent that about a thousand messages were every day 
received in our office or sent from it; and of these 60 per cent, 
were in code. Obviously it was impossible for the Force Com- 
mander to keep constantly at his finger ends all these details. 
All department heads, therefore, were selected because they 
were officers who could be depended upon to handle these 
matters and make decisions independently; they were all 
strong men, and it is to their combined efforts that the 
success of our operations was due. You would have to 
search a long time among the navies of the world before you 
could find an abler convoy officer than Captain Byron A. Long ; 
an abler naval constructor than Captain L. B. McBride; an 
abler man to have charge of the finances of our naval forces, 



252 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the purchase of supplies and all kinds of material than 
Captain (S. C.) Eugene C. Tobey; abler aviation officers than 
Captain H. I. Cone and Lieutenant-Commander W. A. 
Edwards; an abler chief of operations than Captain R. H. 
Leigh, or an abler intelligence officer than Commander J. V 
Babcock. These men, and others of the fourteen depart- 
ment heads, acted as a kind of cabinet. Many of them 
handled matters which, though wholly essential to the 
success of the forces, were quite outside of my personal 
knowledge or experience, and consequently they had to be 
men in whose ability to guide me in such matters I could 
place complete confidence. As an example of this I may 
cite one of the duties of Captain Tobey. Nearly all of the 
very considerable financial transactions he was entrusted 
with were "Greek" to me, but he had only to show me the 
right place on the numerous documents, and I signed my 
name in absolute confidence that the interests of the Govern- 
ment were secure. 

All cables, reports, and other communications were re- 
ferred each day to the department which they concerned. 
The head of each department studied them, attended to the 
great majority on his own responsibility, and selected the few 
that needed more careful attention. A meeting of the Chief 
of Staff and all department heads was held each day, at which 
these few selected matters were discussed in council and 
decisions made. The final results of these deliberations 
were the only matters that were referred to me. This 
system of subdividing responsibility and authority not only 
promoted efficiency but it left the Force Commander time to 
attend to vitally important questions of general policy, to 
keep in personal touch with the high command of the Allied 
navies, to attend the Allied naval councils, and, in general, to 
keep his finger constantly on the pulse of the whole war 
situation. Officers of our own and other navies who were 
always coming in from the outlying stations, and who could 
immediately be placed In touch with the one man who could 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 253 

answer all their questions and give immediate decisions, 
testified to the efficient condition in which the American 
headquarters was maintained. 

One of our departments was so novel, and performed such 
valuable service, that I must describe it in some detail. We 
took over into our London organization an idea that is ad- 
vantageously used in many American industrial establish- 
ments, and had a Planning Section, the first, I think, which 
had ever been adopted by any navy. I detached from all 
other duties five officers: Captain F. H. Schofield, Captain 
D. W. Knox, Captain H. E. Yarnell (who exchanged places 
afterward with Captain L. McNamee of the Plans Section of 
the Navy Department), and Colonel R. H. Dunlap (of the 
Marines), who was succeeded by Colonel L. McC. Little, 
when ordered to command a regiment of Marines in France. 
These men made it their business to advise the Commander- 
in-Chief on any questions that might arise. All were 
graduates of the Naval War College at Newport, and they 
applied to the consideration of war problems the lessons 
which they had learned at that institution. The business 
of the Planning Section was to make studies of particular 
problems, to prepare plans for future operations, and also to 
criticise fully the organization and methods which were 
already in existence. The fact that these men had no 
administrative duties and that they could therefore devote 
all their time to surveying our operations, discovering mis- 
takes, and suggesting better ways of doing things, as well as 
the fact that they were themselves scholarly students of naval 
warfare, made their labors exceedingly valuable. I gave 
them the utmost freedom in finding fault with the existing 
regime; there was no department and no office, from that of 
the Commander-in-Chief down, upon whose activities they 
were not at liberty to submit the fullest and the frankest 
reports. If anything could be done in a better way, we cer- 
tainly wanted to know it. Whenever any specific problem of 
importance came up, it was always submitted to these men 



254 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

for a report. The value of such a report depended upon the 
completeness and accuracy of the information available, and 
it was the business of the Intelligence Department of the staff 
to supply this. If the desired information was not in their 
files, or the files of the Allied admiralties, or was not up to 
date, it was their duty to obtain it at once. The point is 
that the Planning Section had no other duties beyond render- 
ing a decision, based upon a careful analysis of the facts 
bearing upon the case, which they submitted in writing. 
There was no phase of the naval w^arfare upon which the 
officers of the Planning Section did not give us reports. One 
of their favorite methods was to place themselves in the 
position of the Germans and to decide how, if they were 
directing German naval operations, they would frustrate the 
tactics of the Allies. Their records contain detailed descrip- 
tions of how merchant ships could be sunk by submarines, 
and these methods, our officers believed, represented a great 
improvement over those used by the Germans. Indeed, I 
think that many of these reports, had they fallen into the 
hands of the Germans, would have been found by them ex- 
ceedingly useful. There was a general impression, in our 
own navy as well as in the British, that most of the German 
submarine commanders handled their boats unskilfully and 
obtained inadequate results. All these documents were given 
to the responsible men in our forces, as well as to the British, 
and had a considerable influence upon operations. The 
British also established a Planning Section, which worked 
harmoniously with our own. 

A subject upon which our Planning Section liked to specu- 
late was the possible sortie of the German fleet. The possi- 
bility of a great naval engagement filled the minds of most 
naval officers ; and, after we had sent five of our battleships 
to reinforce Admiral Beatty's fleet, this topic became even 
more interesting to American naval men. Would the Ger- 
mans ever come out? What had they to gain or to lose by 
such an undertaking? What were their chances of victory? 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 255 

Where would the engagement be fought, and what part 
would the several elements of modern naval warfare play in 
it: mines, submarines, battle cruisers, airplanes, dirigibles, 
and destroyers? These were among the questions with 
which the Planning Section busied itself, and this problem, 
like many others, they approached from the German stand- 
point. They placed themselves in the position of the German 
High Command, and peered into the Grand Fleet looking 
for a weakness, which, had they been Germans, they might 
turn to account in a general engagement. The only weak 
spot our Planning Section could fmd was one which reflected 
the greatest credit upon the British forces. The British 
commander, Admiral Sir David Beatty, was a particularly 
dashing and heroic fighter; could not these splendid qualities 
really be turned to the advantage of the Germans? That 
Admiral Beatty would fight at the first opportunity, and that 
he would run all justifiable risks, if a chance presented of de- 
feating the German fleet, was as well known to the Germans 
as to ourselves. The British Admiral, it was also known, 
did not entertain much respect for mines and torpedoes. All 
navies possessed what was known as a "torpedo flag." 
This was an emblem which was to be displayed in case tor- 
pedoes were sighted, for the purpose of warning the ships to 
change course or, if necessary, to desist from an attack. 
It was generally reported that Admiral Beatty had ordered 
all these torpedo flags destroyed; in case he once started in 
pursuit of the German fleet, he proposed to take his chances, 
dive straight through a school of approaching torpedoes, or 
even to rush full speed over a mine-field, making no efforts 
to avoid these hidden dangers. That he would probably lose 
some ships the Admiral well knew, but he figured — and 
probably correctly — that he would certainly have enough 
vessels left to annihilate the enemy. Still, in the judgment 
of our Planning Section, Admiral Beatty's assumed attitude 
toward "torpedo flags" gave the Germans their only possible 
chance of seriously injuring the Grand Fleet. They drew 



256 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

up a plan of attack on the Scapa Flow forces based upon 
this assumption. Imagining themselves directors of the 
German navy, they constructed large numbers of torpedo 
boats, submarines, and mine-fields and stationed them in a 
particularly advantageous position; they then proposed to 
send the German fleet in the direction of Scapa Flow, draw 
the Grand Fleet to the attack, and then lead it in the direc- 
tion of the torpedoes and mines. Probably such a scheme 
would never have succeeded; but it represented, in the opin- 
ion of our Planning group, Germany's only chance of crippling 
the Grand Fleet and winning the war. In other words, had 
my staff found itself in Germany's position, that is the strat- 
egy which it would probably have used. I gave this report 
unofficially to the British Admiralty simply because I thought 
it might afford British officers reading that would possibly 
be entertaining. It is an evidence of the cooperation that 
existed between the two forces, and of the British disposition 
to accept suggestions, that this document was immediately 
sent to Admiral Beatty. 

II 

THE FACT that I was able ultimately to create such an 
organization and leave the administration of its individ- 
ual departments so largely to their respective heads was espe- 
cially fortunate because it gave me time for what was perhaps 
the most important of my duties. This was my attendance 
at the meetings of the Allied Naval Council, not to mention 
dailyconferenceswith various officials of the Allies. This naval 
council was the great headquarters for combined Allied opera- 
tions against the enemy on the sea. It was not officially con- 
stituted by the Allied governments until November 29, 19 17, 
but it had actually been in continuous operation since the 
beginning of the war, the heads of the Allied admiralties 
having met frequently in conference. At these meetings 
every phase of the situation was discussed, and the methods 
finally adopted represented the mature judgment of the 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 257 

Allied naval chiefs who participated in them. Without this 
council, and without the cooperation for which it stood, our 
efforts would have been so dispersed and would have so over- 
lapped that their efficiency would have been greatly de- 
creased. This international naval conference not only had 
to decide questions of naval strategy, but it also had to con- 
cern itself with a multitude of practical matters which have 
little interest for the public, but which are exceedingly im- 
portant in war. In this struggle coal, oil, and other materials 
played a part almost as important as ships and men; these 
materials, like ships and men, were limited in quantity; and 
it was necessary to apportion them as deliberately and as 
economically as the seemingly more important munitions of 
warfare. The Germans were constantly changing their tac- 
tics, sometimes they would make their concentrations in a 
certain area; while at other times their strength would appear 
in another field far distant from the first. These changes 
made it necessary that we should in each case readjust our 
forces to counteract the enemy's tactics. It was a vital 
necessity that these readjustments should be made imme- 
diately when the enemy's changes of tactics became known. 
It is evident that the element necessary to success was that 
the earliest and most complete possible information should 
be followed by prompt decision and action ; and it is manifest 
that these requirements could have been satisfied only by a 
council which was fully informed and which was on the spot 
momentarily ready to act. The Allied Naval Council re- 
sponded to all these requirements. One of my first duties, 
after my arrival, was to attend one of these councils in 
Paris; and immediately afterward the meetings became much 
more frequent. 

Not only were the proceedings interesting because of the 
vast importance of the issues which were discussed, but be- 
cause they brought me into intimate contact with some of the 
ablest minds in the European navies. Over the first London 
councils Admiral Jellicoe presided. I have already given my 



258 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

first impressions of this admirable sailor; subsequent events 
only increased my respect for his character and abilities. 
An English woman once described Admiral Jellicoe as "a 
great gentleman"; it is a description upon which 1 can hardly 
improve. The First Lord, Sir Eric Geddes, though he was 
by profession an engineer and had been transferred from the 
business of building roads and assuring the communications 
behind the armies in France to become the civilian head of 
the British navy, acquired, in an astonishingly short time, a 
mastery of the details of naval administration. Sir Eric is 
a type of man that we like to think of as American; perhaps 
the fact that he had received his business training in this 
country, and had served an apprenticeship on the Baltimore 
and Ohio Railroad, strengthened this impression. The 
habitues of the National Sporting Club in London — of whom 
I was one — used to look reproachfully at the giant figure of 
the First Lord; in their opinion he had sadly missed his call- 
ing. His mighty frame, his hard and supple muscles, his 
power of vigorous and rapid movement, his keen eye and his 
quick wit — these qualities, in the opinion of those best quali- 
fied to judge, would have made this stupendous Briton one of 
the greatest heavyweight prize fighters in the annals of pugi- 
lism. With a little training I am sure that Sir Eric would 
even now make a creditable showing in the professional ring. 
However, the paths of this business man and statesman lay 
in other fields. After returning from America he had had a 
brilliant business career in England; he represented the type 
which we call "self-made men"; that is, he fought his way to 
the top without the aid of influential friends. His elevation 
to the Admiralty, in succession to Sir Edward Carson, was 
something new in British public life, for Sir Eric had never 
dabbled in politics, and, until the war started, he was practi- 
cally unknown in political circles. But this crisis in British 
affairs made it necessary for the Ministry to " draft " the most 
capable executives in the nation, irrespective of political 
considerations; and Sir Eric, therefore, quite naturally foun(i 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 259 

himself at the head of the navy. In a short time he had ac- 
quired a knowledge of the naval situation which enabled him 
to preside over an international naval council with a very 
complete grasp of all the problems which were presented. I 
have heard the great naval specialists who attended say that, 
had they not known the real fact, they would hardly have 
suspected that Sir Eric was not a naval man. We admired 
not only his ability to direct the course of discussion, and even 
to take an important part in it, but also his skill at summing 
up the results of the whole proceeding in a few terse and 
masterly phrases. In fine, the First Lord was a man after 
Roosevelt's heart — big, athletic, energetic, with a genius 
for reaching the kernel of a question and of getting things 
done. 

When it came to facility of exposition, however, we Anglo- 
Saxons made a poor showing in comparison with most French 
naval officers and in particular with Admirals Lacaze and 
de Bon, Both these gentlemen represented the Gallic type 
in its finest aspects. After spending a few moments with 
Rear-Admiral Lacaze, it was easy to understand the real 
affection which all French naval officers felt for him. He is 
a small, slight man, with a gray, pointed beard, and he pos- 
sesses that earnestness of spirit, that courtesy of manner, and 
that sympathy and charm which we regard as the finest 
attributes of the cultured Frenchman. Admiral Lacaze has 
also a genuine French facility of speech and that precision of 
statement which is so characteristic of the French intellect. 
A slight acquaintance would make one believe that Admiral 
Lacaze would be a model husband and father, perhaps grand- 
father; it was with surprise, however, that 1 learned that he 
was a bachelor, but I am sure that he is that kind of bachelor 
who is an uncle to all of the children of his acquaintance. 
As Minister of Marine, he was the presiding officer of the 
council when it met in Paris. 

In Vice-Admiral de Bon, chief of the French naval stafl". 
Admiral Lacaze had a worthy colleague ; he was really a man of 



26o THE VICTORY AT SEA 

heroic mould, and he certainly looked the part. His white hair 
and his white beard, cut square, gave at first glance an impres- 
sion of age; yet his clear, pink skin, not ruffled by a trace of 
wrinkle, his erect figure, his bright blue eyes, the vigor of his 
conversation and the energy of his movements, betokened 
rather perpetual youth. Compared with the naval forces of 
Great Britain, the French navy was of inconsiderable size, but 
in Admiral de Bon it made a contribution to Allied naval 
strength which was worth many dreadnaughts. The reputa- 
tion of this man has scarcely reached this side of the Atlantic; 
yet it was the general opinion of practically all naval men 
that his was the keenest mind at the Allied Naval Council. 
It was certainly the most persuasive in argument; and the 
one that had most influence in determining our conclusions. 
Not that there was anything about this great French sailor 
that was arrogant or offensively self-assertive. On the con- 
trary, his manner was all compact of charm and courtesy. 
He was about the most persuasive person I have ever met. 
Whenever an important matter arose, there was some influ- 
ence that made us turn instinctively to Admiral de Bon for 
enlightenment; and, when he rose to talk, the council hung 
upon his every word. For the man was a consummate ora- 
tor. Those who understood French even slightly had little 
difficulty in following the Admiral, for he spoke his delightful 
language with a precision, a neatness of phrase, and a clear- 
ness of enunciation which made every syllable intelligible. 
So perfect did these speeches seem that one would have sus- 
pected that Admiral de Bon had composed them at his leisure, 
but this was not the case; the man apparently had only to 
open his mouth, and his speech spontaneously flowed forth; 
he never hesitated for a word. And his words were not only 
eloquent, but, as I have said, they were full of substance. 
The charm which he manifested on these public occasions 
he carried likewise into his domestic life. Whenever the 
council met in Paris the Admiral's delightful wife and daugh- 
ters entertained us at luncheon^ — an experience which caused 



THE LONDON FLAGSHIP 261 

many of us to regret that it did not always meet in that 
city. 

The other two members of this interesting group were Rear- 
Admiral Funakoshi, representing the Japanese navy, and 
Vice-Admiral di Revel, representing the Italian. The Jap- 
anese was also naval attache at London and the popularity 
which he had acquired in this post he also won in the larger 
field. In some respects, he was not like the conventional 
notion of a Japanese; physically he did not fulfil the accepted 
r61e, for he was tall and heavily built; nor was there anything 
about him that was "inscrutable"; the fact was that he was 
exceedingly frank and open, and apparently loved nothing 
so much as a good joke The remark of a London newspaper 
that Admiral di Revel, the Italian, "unlike Admiral Sims, 
looks every inch the sailor," caused Admiral Funakoshi much 
amusement; he could not resist the temptation to chaff me 
about it. We all became so well acquainted that, in our 
lighter moments, we did not mind having a little fun at one 
another's expense; and in these passages the Japanese repre- 
sentative did not always make the poorest showing. The 
Italian, di Revel, was a source of continual delight. Some- 
one remarked that he was in reality an Irishman who had 
escaped into Italy; and this facetious characterization was 
really not inapt. His shock of red hair, his reddish beard, 
and his short, stocky figure almost persuaded one that County 
Cork was his native soil. He delivered his opinions with 
an insistence which indicated that he entertained little doubt 
about their soundness; he was not particularly patient if 
they were called in question ; yet he was so courteous, so ener- 
getic, and so entertaining that he was a general favorite. 
That his government appreciated his services is shown by the 
fact that it made di Revel a full admiral, a rank which is rarely 
bestowed in Italy. 

Such then were the men who directed the mighty forces 
that defeated the German submarines. The work at the 
councils was arduous, yet the opportunity of associating with 



262 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

such men in such a task is one that comes to few naval officers. 
They all worked with the most indomitable spirit ; not one of 
them ever for a moment showed the slightest discouragement 
over a situation which was at times disquieting, to say the 
least; not one faltered in the determination to force the issue 
to the only logical end. History has given few examples of 
alliances that worked harmoniously. The Allied Naval 
Council did its full share in making harmonious the Allied 
effort against the submarine. 



CHAPTER VIII 
SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 

I 

IT IS not improbable that I have given a false impression 
concerning the relative merits of the several methods 
which were developed for fighting the submarine. De- 
stroyers, patrol boats, subchasers, and mystery ships all 
accomplished great things in solving the most baffling problem 
presented by the war. The belief is general that the most 
successful hunter of the submarine was the destroyer, and, 
so far as absolute figures are concerned, this is true. De- 
stroyers, with their depth charges and their gunfire, sank 
more U-boats than any other agency. One type of craft, 
however, proved a more destructive enemy of the sub- 
marine than even the destroyer. That was a warship of 
whose achievements in this direction little has so far been 
heard. The activities of the German submarine have com- 
pletely occupied public attention; and this is perhaps the 
reason why few newspaper readers, have suspected that there 
were other than German and Austrian submarines constantly 
operating at sea. Everyone has heard of the U-boats, yet 
how many have heard anything of the H-boats, the E-boats, 
the K-boats, and the L-boats? The H-, E-, and K-boats 
were British submarines, and the L-boats were American 
submarines. In the destruction of the German under-water 
craft these Allied submarines proved more successful than 
any kind of surface ship. The Allied destroyers, about 500 
in number, sank 34 German submarines with gunfire and 
depth charges ; auxiliary patrol craft, such as trawlers, yachts, 
and the like, about 3,000 in number, sank 31 ; while the Allied 

263 



264 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

submarines, which were only about loo in number, sank 20. 
Since, therefore, the Allies had about five times as many 
destroyers as submarines at work, it is evident that the record 
of the latter vessels surpasses that of the most formidable 
surface anti-submarine craft. 

Thus the war developed the fact that the most deadly 
enemy of the submarine is the submarine itself. Under-- 
water warfare is evidently a disease in which like cures like. 
In a way this is the most astonishing lesson of the naval 
operations. It is particularly interesting, because it so 
completely demolishes all the ideas on this subject with 
which we entered the war. From that day in history when 
the submarine made its first appearance, the one quality 
which seemed to distinguish it from all other kinds of war- 
ship was that it could not be used to fight itself. Writers 
were fond of pointing out that battleship could fight bat- 
tleship, that cruiser could fight cruiser, that destroyer could 
fight destroyer, but that submarine could not fight subma- 
rine. This supposed quality, which was constantly empha- 
sized, was what seemed to make the introduction of this 
strange vessel such a dangerous thing for the British Empire. 
For more than a hundred years the under-water boat was a 
weapon which was regarded as valuable almost exclusively 
to the weaker sea powers. In the course of the Nineteenth 
Century this engine of sea fighting made many spectacular 
appearances; and significantly it was always heralded as the 
one effective way of destroying British domination at sea. 

The inventor of the modern submarine was an under- 
graduate of Yale named David Bushnell; his famous Turtle, 
according to the great British authority. Sir William White, 
formerly Chief Naval Constructor of the British navy, con- 
tained every fundamental principle of "buoyancy, stability, 
and control of depth" which are found in the modern sub- 
marine; "it cannot be claimed," he said in 1905, "that any 
new principle of design has been discovered or applied since 
Bushnell. ... He showed the way to all his succes- 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 265 

sors. . . . Although alternative methods of fulfilling 
essentials have been introduced and practically tested, in 
the end Bushnell's plans in substance have been found the 
best." The chief inspiration of Bushnell's work was a 
natural hostility to Great Britain, which was at that time 
engaged in war with his own country; his submarine, in- 
vented in 1777, was intended to sink the British warships 
which were then anchored off the American coast, break the 
communications of Great Britain with her revolting colonies, 
and in this way win our liberty. Bushnell did not succeed 
in this ambitious enterprise for reasons which it is hardly 
necessary to set forth in this place ; the fact which I wish to 
emphasize is that he regarded his submarine as an agency 
which would make it possible for the young United States, 
a weak naval power, to deprive Great Britain, the dominant 
sea power, of its supremacy. His successor, Robert Fulton, 
was inspired by a similar ambition. In 1801, Fulton took 
his Nautilus into the harbor of Brest, and blew a merchant 
vessel into a thousand pieces; this dramatic experiment was 
intended to convince Napoleon that there was one way in 
which he could destroy the British fleet and thus deprive 
England of her sea control. Dramatic as this demonstration 
was, it did not convince Napoleon of the value of the sub- 
marine; Fulton therefore took his ship to England and ex- 
hibited it to William Pitt, who was then Prime Minister. 
The great statesman was much impressed, but he did not 
regard the submarine as an innovation that should arouse 
much enthusiasm in England. " If we adopt this kind of 
fighting," he said, "it will be the end of all navies." 

Despite his own forebodings, Pitt sent Fulton to St. 
Vincent, who was then the First Lord of the Admiralty. 

"Pitt is the biggest fool in the world," remarked the head 
of the victorious British navy. "Why does he encourage a 
kind of warfare which is useless to those who are the masters 
of the sea, and which, if it succeeds, will deprive them of 
this supremacy?" 



266 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

The reason for St. Vincent's opposition is apparent. He 
formed the conception of the submarine which has prevailed 
almost up to the present time. In his opinion, a submarine 
was a vessel which could constantly remain under the sur- 
face, approach great warships unseen and blow them to pieces 
at will. This being the case, a nation which possessed two 
or three successfully working engines of this kind could ap- 
parently wipe out the entire British fleet. It therefore 
needed no argument to show that this was a weapon which 
was hardly likely to prove useful to the British navy. If 
the submarine could fulfdl its appointed mission, it would 
give the control of the sea to that nation which used it sue-- 
cessfully; but since Great Britain already controlled the 
sea, the new type of war craft was superfluous to her. In 
the hands of a weak naval power, however, which had every- 
thing to gain and nothing to lose, it might supply the means 
of overthrowing the British Empire. Could one submarine 
destroy another, it would present no particular menace, 
for then, in order to control the sea, it would merely be 
necessary to build a larger under-water fleet than that of any 
prospective enemy: but how could vessels which spent all 
their time under the water, in the dark, ever get a chance 
to come to blows? From these- considerations it seemed 
apparent to St. Vincent and other British experts of his time 
that the best interests of the British Empire would be served, 
not by developing the submarine, but by suppressing it. 
Fulton's biographer intimates that the British Government 
off'ered Fulton a considerable amount of money to take 
his submarine back to America and forget about it ; and there 
is a letter of Fulton's to Lord Granville, saying that "not 
for £20,000 a year would I do what you suggest." But there 
seemed to be no market for his invention, and Fulton there- 
fore returned to America and subsequently gave all his time 
to exploiting the steamboat. On the defensive powers of the 
under-water vessel he also expressed the prevailing idea. 
"Submarine," he said, "cannot fight submarine." 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 267 

The man who designed the type of submarine which has 
become the standard in all modern navies, John P. Holland, 
similarly advocated it as the only means of destroying the 
British navy. Holland was an American of Irish origin; he 
was a member of the Fenian brotherhood, and it was his idea 
that his vessel could be used to destroy the British navy, 
blockade the British coast, and, as an inevitable consequence, 
secure freedom for Ireland. This is the reason why his first 
successful boat was known as the Fenian /?flw, despite the fact 
that it was not a "ram" at all. And the point on which 
Holland always insisted was that the submarine vessel was 
a unique vessel in naval warfare, because there was no 
"answer" to it. "There is nothing that you can send 
against it," he gleefully exclaimed, "not even itself." 

Parliamentary debates in the late 'nineties indicated that 
British naval leaders entertained this same idea. In 1900, 
Viscount Goschen, who was then the First Lord of the Ad- 
miralty, dismissed the submarine as unworthy of considera- 
tion. "The idea of submarine navigation," he said, "is a 
morbid one. We need pay no attention to the submarine 
in naval warfare. The submarine is the arm of weaker 
powers." But Mr. Arnold Foster, who was himself soon to 
become a member of the Admiralty, took exception to these 
remarks. " If the First Lord," he said, "had suggested that 
we should not build submarines because the problems which 
control them are not yet solved, I should have hesitated 
to combat his argument. But the First Lord has not said 
so: he has said that the Admiralty did not care to undertake 
any project for submarines because this type of boat could 
never be anything but the arm of the feeble. However, if 
this boat is made practical, the nation which possesses it will 
cease to be feeble and become in reality powerful. More 
than any other nation do we have reason to fear the sub- 
marine. It is, therefore, not wise to wait with indifference 
while other nations work at the solution of this problem 
>vithout trying to solve it ourselves." "The question of the 



268 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

best way of meeting submarine attack," said Viscount Gos- 
chen at another time, "is receiving much consideration. 
It is in this direction that practical suggestions would be 
valuable. It seems certain that the reply to this weapon 
must be looked for in other directions than in building sub- 
marine boats ourselves, for it is clear that one submarine 
cannot fight another." 

This prepossession dominated all professional naval minds 
in all countries, until the outbreak of the Great War. Yet 
the war had lasted only a few months when the idea was 
shown to be absurd. Practical hostilities soon demonstrated, 
as already said, that not only was the submarine able to fight 
another boat of the same type, but that it was the most 
effective anti-submarine agency which we possessed — so 
effective that the British Admiralty at once began the design 
of a special type of hunting submarine having a high under- 
water speed. 

The fact is that the popular mind, in its attitude toward 
this new type of craft, is still too much under the spell of 
Jules Verne. There is still the disposition to look upon the 
submarine as an insidious vessel which spends practically 
all of its time under the water, stealthily slinks along, never 
once betraying its presence, creeps up at will to its enemy 
and discharges its torpedo. Yet the description which these 
pages have already given of its operations shows the falsity 
of this idea. It is important that we should keep con- 
stantly in mind the fact that the submarine is only occasion- 
ally a submarine; and that for the greater part of its career 
It is a surface boat. In the long journeys which the German 
U-boats made from the Heligoland Bight around Scotland 
and Ireland to those great hunting grounds which lay in 
the Atlantic trade routes, they travelled practically all the 
time on the surface of the water. The weary weeks during 
which they cruised around, looking for their victims, they 
also spent almost entirely on the surface. There were 
virtually only two circumstances which compelled them 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 269 

to disappear beneath the waves. The first of these was the 
occasion on which the submarine detected a merchant ship; 
in this case it submerged, for the success of its attempt to 
torpedo depended entirely upon its operating unseen. The 
second occasion which made it necessary to submerge was 
when it spied a destroyer or other dangerous patrolhng 
craft; the submarine, as has been said, could not fight a 
vessel of this type with much chance of success. Thus the 
ability to submerge was merely a quality that was utilized 
only in those crises when the submarine either had to escape 
a vessel which was stronger than itself or planned to attack 
one which was weaker. 

The time taken up by these disappearances amounted to 
only a fraction of the total period consumed in a cruise. Yet 
the fact that the submarine had to keep itself momentarily 
ready to make these disappearances is precisely the reason 
why it was obliged to spend the larger part of its time on the 
surface. The submarine has two sets of engines, one for 
surface travel and the other for subsurface travel. An oil 
engine propels it on the top of the water, but this consumes 
a large amount of air, and, for this reason, it cannot be used 
when travelling under the surface. As soon as the vessel 
dives, therefore, it changes its motive power to an electric 
motor, which makes no inroads on the oxygen needed for 
sustaining the life of its crew. But the physical limitation 
of size prevents the submarine from carrying large storage 
batteries, which is only another way of saying that its cruis- 
ing radius under the water is extremely small, not more 
than fifty or sixty miles. In order to recharge these batteries 
and gain motive power for subsurface travel, the submarine 
has to come to the surface. Yet the simple fact that the 
submarine can accomplish its destructive work only when 
submerged, and that it can avoid its enemy only by diving, 
makes it plain that it must always hold itself in readiness 
to submerge on a moment's notice and remain under water 
the longest possible time. That is, its storage batteries 



270 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

must always be kept at their highest eificiency; they must 
not be wasted by unnecessary travelling under the water; 
the submarine, in other words, must spend all its time on 
the surface, except those brief periods when it is attempting 
to attack a merchant ship or escape an enemy. Almost 
the greatest tragedy in the life of a submarine is to meet a 
surface enemy, such as a destroyer — when its electric bat- 
teries are exhausted. It cannot submerge, for it can stay 
submerged only when it is in motion, unless it is in water 
shallow enough to permit it to rest on the bottom. Even 
though it may have a little electricity, and succeed in getting 
under water, it cannot stay there long, for its electric power 
will soon be used up, and therefore, it is soon faced with the 
alternative of coming to the surface and surrendering, or of 
being destroyed. The success of the submarine, indeed 
its very existence, depends upon the vessel spending the 
largest possible part of its time upon the surface, keeping 
its full supply of electric power constantly in reserve, so that 
it may be able to dive at a moment's notice and to remain 
under the water for the maximum period. 

This purely mechanical limitation explains why the Ger- 
man submarine was not a submarine in the popularly ac- 
cepted meaning of that term. Yet the fact that this vessel 
remained for the greater part of its existence on the surface 
was no particular disadvantage, so long as it was called upon 
to contend only with surface vessels. Even with the larger 
part of its decks exposed the U-boat was a comparatively 
small object on the vast expanse of the sea. I have already 
made clear the great disadvantage under which destroyers 
and other patrolling vessels labored in their attempts to 
*'hunt" this type of enemy. A destroyer, small as it is, was 
an immensely larger object than the under-water boat, and 
the consequence was that the lookout on a submarine, 
proceeding along on the surface, could detect the patrolling 
vessel long before it could be observed itself. All the sub- 
marine had to do, therefore, whenever the destroyer ap- 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 271 

peared on the horizon, was to seek safety under water, re- 
main there until its pursuer had passed out of sight, and then 
rise again and resume its operations. Before the adoption 
of the convoy system, when the Allied navies were depending 
chiefly upon the patrol — that is, sending destroyers and 
other surface craft out upon the high seas to hunt for the 
enemy — the enemy submarines frequently operated in the 
same areas as the patrol vessels, and were only occasionally 
inconvenienced by having to keep under the water to conceal 
their presence. But let us imagine that the destroyer, in ad- 
dition to its depth charges, its torpedoes, its guns, and its 
abiHty to ram, had still another quality. Suppose, for a 
moment, that, like the submarine, it could steam submerged, 
put up a periscope which would reveal everything within 
the radius of a wide horizon and that, when it had picked up 
an enemy submarine, it could approach rapidly under the 
water, and discharge a torpedo. It is evident that such a 
manoeuvre as this would have deprived the German of the 
only advantage which it possessed over all other war craft — 
its ability to make itself unseen. 

No destroyer can accomplish any such magical feat as 
this: indeed there is only one kind of vessel that can do so, 
and that is another submarine. This illustration immediately 
makes it clear why the Allied submarine itself was the most 
destructive enemy of the German submarine. When Robert 
Fulton, John P. Holland, and other authorities declared that 
the under-water vessel could not fight its own kind, it is 
evident that they had not themselves foreseen the ways in 
which their inventions were to be used. They regarded their 
craft as ships that would sail the larger part of the time under 
the waves, coming up only occasionally to get their bearings 
and to take in a fresh supply of air. It was plain to these 
pioneers that vessels which spent practically all their time 
submerged could not fight each other, for the sufficient reason 
that they could not see each other; a combat under these con- 
ditions would resemble a prize fight between two blindfolded 



272 THEVICTORYATSEA 

pugilists. Neither would such vessels fight upon the surface, 
for, even though they were supplied with guns — ^things which 
did not figure in the early designs of submarines — one boat 
could decline the combat simply by submerging. In the 
minds of Fulton and Holland an engagement between such 
craft would reduce itself to mutual attempts to ram each other 
under the water, and many fanciful pictures of the early 
days portrayed exciting deep-sea battles of this kind, in which 
submarines, looking like mighty sea monsters, provided with 
huge glaring headlights, made terrific lunges at each other. 
None of the inventors foresaw that, in such battles as would 
actually take place, the torpedo would be used, and that the 
submarine which was defeated would succumb to one of 
those same stealthy attacks which it was constantly meditat- 
ing against surface craft. 

Another point of the highest importance is that in a con- 
flict of submarine against submarine the Allied boats had 
one great advantage over the German. Hans Rose and 
Valentiner and Moraht and other U-boat commanders, as 
already explained, had to spend most of their time on the sur- 
face in order to keep their batteries fully supplied with elec- 
tricity, in readiness for the dives that would be necessary 
when the Allied destroyers approached. But the Allied 
submarine commander did not have to maintain this con- 
stant readiness; the reason, it is hardly necessary to say, is 
that the Allied submarine had no surface enemies, for there 
were no German surface craft operating on the high seas; 
the Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow was carefully attending to 
that very essential detail. Occasionally, indeed, our sub- 
marines were attacked by our own destroyers, but accidents 
of this kind, though uncomfortably frequent, were not 
numerous enough to interfere with the operation I have in 
mind. The statement seems almost like a contradiction in 
terms, yet it is entirely true, that, simply because the Allied 
submarines did not have to hold themselves constantly ready 
to submerge, they could in fact spend a considerable part 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 273 

of their time under the water, for they were not compelled 
to economize electric power so strictly. This gave them a 
great advantage in hunting the U-boats. British and Am- 
erican submarines could fully charge their batteries, drop 
under water and cruise around with enough speed to main- 
tain a horizontal position at "periscope depth," that is, a 
depth just sufficient to enable them to project the periscope 
above the water whenever desired. This speed was so very 
slow — about one mile an hour — that it could be kept up an 
entire day without exhausting the electric batteries. 

The net result was this : The German submarine necessarily 
sailed most of the time on the surface with its conning tower 
and deck exposed, whereas the Allied submarine, when on 
its hunting grounds, spent all of the daylight hours under 
water, with only the periscope visible from time to time for 
a few seconds. Just as the German U-boat could "spot" 
an Allied destroyer at a great distance without being itself 
seen, so could the periscope invariably see the German sub- 
marine on the surface long before this tiny object came 
within the view of a U-boat conning tower. Our submarine 
commander could remain submerged, sweep the ocean with 
his periscope until he had picked up the German enemy; 
then, still under water, and almost invariably unseen, he 
could steal up to a position within range, and discharge a 
torpedo into its fragile side. The German submarine re- 
ceived that same treatment which it was itself administering 
to harmless merchantmen; it was torpedoed without warn- 
ing; inasmuch, however, as it was itself a belligerent vessel, 
the proceeding violated no principle of international law. 

II 

THE Allied submarines, like many other patrol craft, 
spent much of their time in those restricted waters which 
formed the entrances to the British Isles. Their favorite 
places were the English Channel, St. George's Channel, 
which forms the southern entrance to the Irish Sea, and the 



274 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

northern passageway between Scotland and Ireland. At 
these points, it may be remembered, the cargo ships could 
usually be found sailing singly, either entirely unescorted, 
or escorted inadequately, while on their way to join a convoy 
or to their destinations after the dispersal of a convoy; these 
areas were thus almost the only places where the German 
submarines had much chance of attacking single vessels. 
The territory was divided into squares, each one of which was 
indicated by a letter; and the section assigned to each sub- 
marine was known as its "billet." Under ordinary circum- 
stances, the Allied submarine spent all its time, while pa- 
trolling, on its own particular "billet"; only in case the 
pursuit of an enemy led it outside the "square," was it 
permissible to leave. Allied submarines also hunted the 
U-boats in the North Sea on the routes which the latter 
had to take in coming out or returning through the passages 
in the German mine-fields of the Heligoland Bight, or through 
the Skager Rack. 

As previously explained, in the daytime the Allied sub- 
marine remained under the water, its periscope exposed 
for a short time every fifteen minutes or so, sweeping 
the sea for a distance of many miles. As soon as dark- 
ness set in, the boat usually emerged, began taking in 
new air and recharging its batteries, the crew seizing the 
opportunity to stretch their legs and catch a welcome 
glimpse of the external world. The simple fact that the 
Allied submarines spent- the larger part of their time under 
water, while the German spent the larger part of their time 
on the surface, gave our boats a great military advantage 
over the foe, but it likewise made existence in our submarine 
service more arduous. Even on the coldest winter days 
there could be no artificial heat, for the precious electricity 
could not be spared for that purpose, and the temperature 
inside the submarine was the temperature of the water in 
which it sailed. The close atmosphere, heavily laden also 
with the smell of oil from the engines and the odors of cook- 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 275 

ing, and the necessity of going for days at a time without a 
bath or even a wash added to the discomfort. The stability of 
a submerged submarine is by no means perfect; the vessel is 
constantly rolling, and a certain number of the crew, even the 
experienced men, are frequently seasick. This movement 
sometimes made it almost impossible to stay in a bunk and 
sleep for any reasonable period; the poor seaman would 
perhaps doze off, but a lurch of the vessel would send him 
sprawling on the deck. One could hardly write, for it was 
too cold, or read, for there was little light ; and because of the 
motion of the vessel, it was difficult to focus one's eyes on 
the page. A limited amount of smoking was permitted, 
but the air was sometimes so vitiated that only the most 
vigorous and incessant puifmg could keep a cigarette alight! 
One of the most annoying things about the submarine 
existence is the fact that the air condenses on the sides as the 
coldness increases, so that practically everything becomes 
wet; as the sailor lies in his bunk this moisture is precipi- 
tated upon him like rain drops. This combination of dis- 
comforts usually produced, after spending a few hours under 
the surface, that mental state commonly known as 
"dopey." 

The usual duration of a "cruise" was eight days, and by 
the end of that time many of the crew were nearly "all in," 
and some of them entirely so. But the physical sufferings 
were the least discomfiting. Any moment the boat was 
likely to hit one of the mines the Germans were always 
planting. A danger which was particularly vexatious was 
that a British or an American submarine was just about as 
likely to be attacked by Allied surface craft as the Germans 
themselves. At the beginning, recognition signals were 
arranged by which it was expected that an Allied under- 
water craft, coming to the surface, could make its identity 
known to a friendly warship; sometimes these signals suc- 
ceeded, but more frequently they failed, and the attacks 
which British and American destroyers made upon their own 



276 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

submarines demonstrated that there was no certainty that 
such signals would offer any protection. A rather grim order 
directed all destroyers and other patrol craft to sink any 
submarine on sight, unless there was positive information 
that a friendly submarine was operating in the neighbor- 
hood. To a large extent, therefore, the life of our sub- 
marine sailors was the same as that of the Germans. Our 
men know how it feels to have a dozen depth charges ex- 
plode around them, for not infrequently they have had to 
endure this sort of thing from their own comrades. Mis- 
takes of this sort, even though not very numerous, were so 
likely to happen at any time that whenever an Allied sub- 
marine saw an Allied destroyer at a distance, it usually be- 
haved just as a German would have behaved under the same 
conditions : it dived precipitately to the safety of deep water. 
Our men, that is, did not care to take the risk of a discussion 
with the surface craft ; it was more prudent to play the part 
of an enemy. One day one of the American submarines, 
lying on the surface, saw an American destroyer, and, 
cheered in their loneliness by the sight of such a friendly 
vessel, waited for it to approach, making all the identifica- 
tion signals carefully set down in the books. Instead of a 
cordial greeting, however, about twenty rounds of pro- 
jectiles began falling about the L-boat, which as hastily as 
possible dropped to sixty feet under the surface. In a few 
minutes depth charges began exploding around him in 
profusion, the plates of the vessel shook violently, the lights 
went out, and the end seemed near. Making a last effort, 
the American submarine rose to the surface, sent up all the 
recognition signals the officers could think of, and this time 
with success. The destroyer approached, the commander 
shouting from the bridge: 

"Who are you?" 

"American submarine A L-io." 

"Good luck, old man," came a now familiar voice from 
the bridge. "This is Bill." 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 277 

The commander of the destroyer and the commander of 
the submarine had been roommates at AnnapoHs ! 

In other ways our submarine force passed through the 
same experiences as the Germans. Its adventures shed the 
utmost light upon this campaign against merchantmen which 
the Germans had depended upon to win the war. The ob- 
server at the periscope was constantly spotting huge Allied 
merchantmen making their way into port. The great 
ships sailed on, entirely oblivious of the periscope and the 
eye of the British or American watcher fixed upon them. 

"How easy to sink her!" the observer would say to him- 
self. This game in which the Germans were engaged was a 
dangerous one, because of Allied anti-submarine craft; but, 
when it came to attacking merchant ships, it was the easiest 
thing in the world. After a few weeks in a submarine, it 
grew upon our men that the wonder was not that the Ger- 
mans had sunk so many merchant ships, but that they had 
sunk so few. Such an experience emphasized the conviction, 
which was prevalent in both the British and American navies, 
that the Germans were not particularly skilful at the occupa- 
tion which seemed to be so congenial to them. Indeed, 
there are few things in the world that appear so absolutely 
helpless as a great merchant ship when observed through the 
periscope of an under-water boat. 

Whenever an Allied submarine met its enemy the contest 
was usually a short one. The issue, one way or the other, 
was determined in a few minutes. On rare occasions, there 
were attempts to ram ; almost invariably, however, it was the 
torpedo which settled the conflict. If our boat happened to 
be on the surface when it sighted the German, which, how- 
ever, was very seldom the case, the first manoeuvre was to 
dive as quickly and as unostentatiously as possible. If it 
succeeded in getting under before the U-boat discovered its 
presence, it then crept up, guided only by the periscope, un- 
til it had reached a spot that was within range. The combat, 
as Avas the case so frequently in this war, was one-sided. 



278 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

The enemy submarine seldom knew its assailant was any- 
where in the neighborhood; a merchant ship, from its rela- 
tively high bridge, could sometimes see the torpedo approach 
and turn out of its way; but it was almost impossible to see a 
wake from the low conning tower or periscope of a submarine, 
and no one except the observer had a glimpse of the surface. 
The small size of the submarine was in itself a great pro- 
tection; we launched many torpedoes, but only occasionally 
scored a hit. The missile would usually pass a few feet ahead 
or astern, or would glide over or under the submerged hulk, 
perhaps a few inches only saving it from destruction. Once 
an American torpedo hit its enemy squarely on the side but 
failed to explode ! If the torpedo once struck and functioned, 
however, it was all over in a few seconds. A huge geyser of 
water would leap into the air; and the submarine would some- 
times rise at the same time, or parts of it would fly in a dozen 
directions; then the waters would gradually subside, leaving 
a mammoth oil patch, in which two or three members of the 
crew might be discovered struggling in the waves. Most of the 
men in the doomed vessel never knew what had struck them. 
Thus, early one evening in May, 19 18, the £"-55, a British 
submarine, was patrolling its billet in the Atlantic, about two 
hundred miles west of Gibraltar. About two or three miles 
on the port beam a long, low-lying object was distinguished 
on the surface; the appearance was nondescript, but, to the 
practised eye at the periscope, it quickly took shape as an 
enemy submarine. As the sea was rather rough, the £"-^5 
dived to forty feet; after a little while it ascended to twenty- 
six, put up the periscope, and immediately saw, not far away, 
a huge enemy submarine proceeding north at a leisurely 
pace, never once suspecting that one of its own kind was on 
its trail. In order to get within range and cut the German 
off, the Britisher dived again to forty feet, went ahead for 
twenty minutes with all the speed it could muster, and again 
came near enough the surface to put up its periscope. Now 
it was directly astern; still the British submarine was not 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 279 

near enough for a sure shot, so again it plunged beyond peri- 
scope depth, coming up at intervals during the next hour, 
each time observing with satisfaction that it was lessening 
the distance between itself and its prey. When the range 
had been decreased to two hundred and fifty yards, and when 
the E-j$ had succeeded in getting in such a position that it 
could fire its torpedo, the missile was launched in the direc- 
tion of the foe. But this was only another of the numerous 
occasions when the shot missed. Had the German sub- 
marine been a surface ship, it would have seen the wake and 
probably escaped by flight; but still it sailed nonchalantly 
on its way, never suspecting for a moment that a torpedo had 
missed its vitals by only a few feet. Soon the E-j^ crept 
still closer, and fired two torpedoes simultaneously from its 
bow tubes. Both hit at the same time. Not a glimpse of 
the German submarine was seen from that moment. A 
terrific explosion was heard, a mountain of water rose in the 
air, then in a few seconds everything was still. A small patch 
of oil appeared on the surface; this gradually expanded in 
size until it covered a great area; and then a few German 
sailors came up and started swimming toward the British 
vessel. 

We Americans had seven submarines based on Berehaven, 
Ireland, whose "billets" were located in the approaches to 
the Irish Sea. The most spectacular achievement of any 
one of our boats was a curious mixup with a German subma- 
rine, the details of which have never been accurately ascer- 
tained, but the practical outcome of which was indisputably 
the sinking of the German boat. After a week's hard work 
on patrol, the A L-2 was running back to her base on the sur- 
face when the lookout sighted a periscope. The A L-2 
at once changed her course, the torpedo was made ready to 
fire, when the quiet of the summer afternoon was rent by a 
terrific roar and explosion. It was quite apparent that some- 
thing exceedingly distressing had happened to the German 
submarine; the American turned, and made a steep dive, 



28o THE VICTORY AT SEA 

in an attempt to ram the enemy, but failed. Listening with 
the hydrophone, the A L-2 could hear, now the whirring 
of propellers, which indicated that the submarine was at- 
tempting to gain surface and having difficulty in doing so, 
and now and then the call letters of the German under-water 
signal set, which seemed to show that the vessel was in dis- 
tress and was sending appeals for aid. According to the Ad- 
miralty records, a German submarine operating in that area 
never returned to port; so it seems clear enough that this 
German was lost. Commander R. C. Grady, who com- 
manded the American submarine division, believes that the 
German spotted the American boat before it was itself seen, 
that it launched a torpedo, that this torpedo made an erratic 
course ( a not infrequent trick of a torpedo) around our ship, 
returned and hit the vessel from which it started. There 
are others who think that there were two German submarines 
in the neighborhood, that one fired at our boat, missed it, 
and that its torpedo sped on and struck its mate. Probably 
the real facts about the happening will never be explained. 

Besides the actual sinkings to their credit, the Allied sub- 
marines accomplished strategic results of the utmost import- 
ance. We had reason to believe that the Germans feared 
them almost more than any other agency, unless it was the 
mine. "We got used to your depth charges," said the com- 
mander of a captured submarine, "and did not fear them; 
but we lived in constant dread of your submarines. We 
never knew what moment a torpedo was going to hit us." 
So greatly did the Germans fear this attack that they care- 
fully avoided the areas in which the Allied under-water boats 
were operating. We soon learned that we could keep any 
section free of the Germans which we were able to patrol 
with our own submarines. It also soon appeared that the 
German U-boats would not fight our subsurface vessels. At 
first this may seem rather strange; certainly a combat be- 
tween two ships of the same kind, size, and armament would 
seem to be an equal one; the disinclination of the German to 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 281 

give battle under such conditions would probably strike 
the layman as sheer cowardice. But in this attitude the 
Germans were undoubtedly right. 

The business of their submarines was not to fight war- 
ships; it was exclusively to destroy merchantmen. The 
demand made upon the U-boat commanders was to get 
"tonnage! tonnage!" Germany could win the war in only 
one way: that was by destroying Allied shipping to such an 
extent that the Allied sea communications would be cut, 
and the supplies of men and munitions and food from the 
United States shut off. For this tremendous task Germany 
had an inadequate number of submarines and torpedoes. 
Only by economizing to the utmost extent on these vessels 
and these weapons could she entertain any hope of success. 
Had Germany possessed an unlimited quantity of submarines 
and torpedoes, she might perhaps have profitably expended 
some of them in warfare on British " H-boats" and American 
"L-boats"; or, had there been a certainty of "getting" an 
Allied submarine with each torpedo fired, it would have been 
justifiable to use these weapons, small as was the supply. 
The fact was, however, that the Allies expended many tor- 
pedoes for every submarine sunk; and this was clearly a game 
which Germany could not afford to play. Evidently the 
U-boats had orders to slip under the water whenever an Allied 
submarine was seen; at least this was the almost invariable 
procedure. Thus the Allied submarines compelled their 
German enemies to do the one thing which worked most to 
their disadvantage: that is, to keep submerged when in the 
same area with our submarines; this not only prevented them 
from attacking merchantmen, but forced them to consume 
their electric power, which, as I have already explained, 
greatly diminished their efficiency as attacking ships. 

The operations of Allied submarines also greatly diminished 
the value of the "cruiser" submarines which Germany be- 
gan to construct in 19 17. These great subsurface vessels 
were introduced as an "answer" to the convoy system, 



232 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

The adoption of the convoy, as I have already explained, 
made it ineffective for the Germans to hunt far out at sea. 
Until the Allies had put this plan into operation, the rela- 
tively small German U-boats could go two or three hundred 
miles into the Atlantic and pick off almost at will the mer- 
chant ships, which were then proceeding alone and unes- 
corted. But now the destroyers went out to a point two or 
three hundred miles from the British coast, formed a pro- 
tecting screen around the convoy, and escorted the grouped 
ships into restricted waters. The result of this was to drive 
the submarines into these coastal waters; here again, how- 
ever, they had their difficulties with destroyers, subchasers, 
submarines, and other patrol craft. It will be recalled that 
no destroyer escort was provided for the merchant convoys 
on their way across the Atlantic; the Allies simply did not 
have the destroyers for this purpose. The Germans could 
not send surface raiders to attack these convoys in mid-ocean, 
first, because their surface warships could not escape from 
their ports in sufficient numbers to accomplish any decisive 
results, and, secondly, because Allied surface warships ac- 
companied every convoy to protect them against any such 
attack. There was only one way in which the Germans 
could attack the convoys in mid-ocean. A fleet of great 
ocean-going submarines, which could keep the sea for two or 
three months, might conceivably destroy the whole convoy 
system at a blow. The scheme was so obvious that Germany 
in the summer of 191 7 began building ships of this type. 
They were about 300 feet long, displaced about 3,000 tons, 
carried fuel and supplies enough to maintain themselves for 
three or four months from their base, and, besides torpedoes, 
had 6-inch guns that could outrange a destroyer. By the 
time the armistice was signed Germany had built about 
twenty of these ships. But they possessed little offensive 
value against merchantmen. The Allied submarines and 
destroyers kept them from operating in the submarine zone. 
They are so difficult to manoeuvre that not only could they 



SUBMARINE AGAINST SUBMARINE 283 

not afford to remain in the neighborhood of our anti- 
submarine craft, but they were not successful in attacking 
merchant vessels. They never risked torpedoing a convoy, 
and rarely even a single vessel, but captured a number by 
means of their superior gunfire. These huge "cruiser sub- 
marines," which aroused such fear in the civilian mind when 
the news of their existence first found its way into print, 
proved to be the least harmful of any of the German types. 
The Allied submarines accomplished another result of the 
utmost importance. They prevented the German U-boats 
from hunting in groups or flotillas. All during 19 17 and 
1 9 18 the popular mind conjured up frightful pictures of U- 
boat squadrons, ten or fifteen together, lying in wait for our 
merchantmen or troopships. Hardly a passenger crossed 
the ocean without seeing a dozen German submarines con- 
stantly pursuing his ship. In a speech which I made to a 
group of American editors who visited England in September, 
1918, I touched upon this point. "I do not know," I told 
these journalists, "how many submarines you gentlemen saw 
on the way over here, but if you had the usual experience, 
you saw a great many. I have seen many accounts in our 
papers on this subject. If you were to believe these ac- 
counts, you could only conclude that many vessels have 
crossed the ocean with difficulty because submarines were so 
thick that they scraped all the paint off the vessels' sides. 
All of these accounts are, of course, unofficial. They get 
into the American papers in various ways. It is to be re- 
gretted that they should be published and thereby give a 
false impression. Some time ago I saw a letter from one 
of our men who came over here on a ship bound into the 
English Channel. This letter was written to his girl. He 
said that he intended to take the letter on shore and slip it 
into a post box so that the censor would not see it. The 
censor did see it and it eventually came to me. This man 
was evidently intent on impressing on his girl the dangers 
through which he had passed. It related that the vessel on 



284 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

which he had made the voyage had met two or three subma- 
rines a day; that two spies were found on board and hanged; 
and it said, 'When we arrived off our port there were no less 
than eighteen submarines waiting for us. Can you beat it?' " 
Perhaps in the early days of the war the German U-boats 
did hunt in flotillas ; if so, however, they were compelled to 
abandon the practice as soon as the Allied submarines began 
to operate effectively. I have already indicated the cir- 
cumstances which reduced their under-sea operations to a 
lonely enterprise. In the open sea it was impossible to tell 
whether a submarine was a friend or an enemy. We never 
knew whether a submarine on the surface was one of our own 
or a German ; as a result, as already said, we gave orders to 
attack any under-water boat, unless we had absolute knowl- 
edge that it was a friend. Unquestionably the Germans had 
the same instructions. It would therefore be dangerous 
for them to attempt to operate in groups, for they would 
have no way of knov/ing that their supposed associate was 
not an Allied or an American submarine. Possibly, even 
after our submarines had become exceedingly active, the 
Germans may have attempted to cruise in pairs; one explana- 
tion of the strange adventure of the A L-2, as said above, was 
that there were two U-boats in the neighborhood; yet the 
fact remains that there is no well-established case on record 
in which they did so. This circumstance that they had to 
operate singly was a strategic point greatly to our advantage, 
especially, as I shall describe, when we began transporting 
American troops. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 
IN THE NORTH SEA 

I 

WAS there no more satisfactory way of de- 
stroying submarines than by pursuing them 
with destroyers, sloops, chasers, and other 
craft in the open seas? It is hardly surpris- 
ing that our methods impressed certain of 
our critics as tedious and ill conceived, and that a mere glance 
at a small map of the North Sea suggested a far more reason- 
able solution of the problem. The bases from which the 
German submarines found their way to the great centres of 
shipping were Ostend and Zeebrugge on the Belgian coast, 
Wilhelmshaven and Cuxhaven on the German coast, and 
the harbor of Kiel in the Baltic Sea. From all these points 
the voyage to the waters that lay west and south of Ireland 
was a long and difficult one; in order to reach these hunting 
grounds, the German craft had either to pass through the 
Strait of Dover to the south, or through the wide passage- 
way of the North Sea that stretched between the Shetland 
Islands and Norway, and thence sail around the northern 
coast of Ireland. We necessarily had little success in at- 
tempting to interfere with the U-boats while they were 
making these lengthy open-sea voyages, but concentrated 
our efforts on trying to oppose them after they had reached 
the critical areas. 

But a casual glance at the map convinced many people 
that our procedure was a mistake. And most newspaper 
readers in those days were giving much attention to this map. 

285 



286 



THE VICTORY AT SEA 



SHETLAND IS.<50 



KORWAY I 




THE NORTH SEA BARRAGE 

Just how many German submarines were sunk in attempting to get by this 
barrage will never be known, for it did its work silently without any observers. 
It was probably a contributory cause of the mutiny which demoralized the German 
fleet in the fall of 1 918. 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 287 

Many periodicals, published in Great Britain and the United 
States, were fond of exhibiting to their readers diagrams of 
the North Sea; these diagrams contained one heavy black 
bar drawn across the Straits of Dover and another drawn 
across the northern passage from Scotland to Norway. 
The accompanying printed matter informed the public that 
these pictures illustrated the one effective "answer" to the 
submarine. The black bars of printer's ink represented 
barrages of mines and nets, which, if they were once laid 
between the indicated spots, would blow to pieces any sub- 
marine which attempted to force a way across. Not a single 
German U-boat could therefore succeed in getting out of the 
North Sea. All the trans-Atlantic ships which contained the 
food supplies and war materials so essential to Allied success 
would thus be able to land on the west coast of England and 
France; the submarine menace would automatically dis- 
appear and the war on the sea would be won. Unfortu- 
nately, it was not only the pictorial artists employed on 
newspapers and magazines who insisted that this was the 
royal road to success. Plenty of naval men, in the United 
States and in Europe, were constantly advancing the conten- 
tion, and statesmen in our own country and in Allied coun- 
tries were similarly fascinated by this programme. When I 
arrived in London, in April, 19 17, the great plan of confining 
the submarines to their bases was everywhere a lively topic 
of discussion. There was not a London club in which the 
Admiralty was not denounced for its stupidity in not adopt- 
ing such a perfectly obvious plan. The way to destroy a 
swarm of hornets — such was the favorite simile — was to 
annihilate them in their nests, and not to hunt and attack 
them, one by one, after they had escaped into the open. 
What the situation needed was not a long and wearisome 
campaign, involving unlimited new construction to offset 
the increasing losses of life and shipping, and altogether too 
probable defeat in the end, but a swift and terrible blow 
which would end the submarine menace overnight. 



288 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

The naval officers who expressed fears that, under the 
shipping conditions prevaiHng in 19 17, such a brilliant per- 
formance could not possibly be carried out in time to avoid 
defeat, merely gained a reputation for timidity and lack of 
resourcefulness. When the First Lord of the Admiralty, 
Winston Churchill, in 191 5 declared that the British fleet 
would "dig the Germans out of their holes like rats," his re- 
marks did not greatly impress naval strategists, but they 
certainly sounded a note which was popular in England. 
One fact, not generally known at that time, demonstrated 
the futility of the whole idea. Most newspaper critics as- 
sumed that the barrage from Dover to Calais was keeping the 
submarines out of the Channel. That the destroyers, air- 
craft, and other patrols were safely escorting troopships and 
other vessels across the Channel was a fact of which the Brit- 
ish public was justly proud. Yet it did not necessarily follow 
that the submarines could not use the Channel as a passage- 
way from their German bases to their operating areas in the 
focus of Allied shipping routes. The mines and nets in the 
Channel, of which so much was printed in the first three years 
of the war, did not offer an effective barrier to the submarines. 
This was due to various reasons too complicated for descrip- 
tion in a book of this untechnical nature. The unusually 
strong tides and rough weather experienced in the vicinity 
of the Straits of Dover are well known. As one British officer 
expressed it at the time, "our experience in attempting to 
close the Strait has involved both blood and tears" — blood 
because of the men who were lost in laying the mines and 
nets, and tears because the arduous work of weeks would be 
swept away in a storm of a single night. In addition, at this 
stage of the war the British were still experimenting with 
mines; they had discovered gradually that the design which 
they had used up to that time — the same design which was 
used in the American navy — ^was defective. But the process 
of developing new mines in war time had proved slow and 
difficult ; and the demands of the army on the munition fac- 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 289 

tories had prevented the Admiralty from obtaining a suffi- 
cient number. The work of the Dover patrols was a glorious 
one, as will appear when all of the facts come to public knowl- 
edge. But in 19 1 7 this patrol was not preventing the U-boats 
from slipping through the Channel. The Strait of Dover, 
at the point where this so-called barrage was supposed to have 
existed, is about twenty miles wide. The passageway be- 
tween Scotland and Norway is 250 miles wide. The water 
in the Channel has an average depth of a few fathoms; in 
the northern expanse of the North Sea it reaches an average 
depth of 600 feet. Mining in such deep waters had never 
been undertaken or even considered before by any nation. 
The English Channel is celebrated for its strong tides and 
stormy weather, but it is not the scene of the tempestuous 
gales which rage so frequently in the winter months in these 
northern waters. If the British navy had not succeeded in 
constructing an effective mine barrier across the English 
Channel, what was the likelihood that success would crown 
an effort to build a much greater obstruction in the far more 
difficult waters to the north? 

The one point which few understood at that time was that 
the mere building of the barrage would not in itself prevent 
the escape of submarines from the North Sea. Besides 
building such a barrage, it would be necessary to protect it 
with surface vessels. Otherwise German mine- sweepers 
could visit the scene, and sweep up enough of the obstruction 
to make a hole through which their submarines could pass. 
It is evident that, in a barrage extending 250 miles, it would 
not be difficult to find some place in which to conduct such 
sweeping operations; it is also clear that it would take a 
considerable number of patrolling vessels to watch such an 
extensive barrier and to interfere with such operations. More- 
over, we could not send our mine-layers into the North Sea 
without destroyer escort; that is, it would be necessary to 
detach a considerable part of our forces to protect these ships 
while they were laying their mines. Those responsible for 



290 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

anti-submarine operations believed that in the spring and 
summer of 19 17 it would have been unwise to detach these 
anti-submarine vessels from the area in which they were 
performing such indispensable service. The overwhelming 
fact was that we needed all the surface craft we could assem-. 
ble for the convoy system. The destroyers which we had 
available for this purpose were entirely inadequate; to have 
diverted any of them for other duties would at that time 
have meant destruction to the Allied cause. The object of 
placing the barrage so far north was to increase the enemy's 
difficulty in attempting to sweep a passage through it and 
facilitate its defence by our forces. The impossibility of 
defending a mine barrier placed too far south was shown by 
experience in that area of the North Sea which was known 
as the "wet triangle." By April, 19 17, the British had laid 
more than 30,000 mines in the Bight of Heligoland, and were 
then increasing these obstructions at the rate of 3,000 mines a 
month. Yet this vast explosive field did not prevent the 
Germans from sending their submarines to sea. The enemy 
sweepers were dragging out channels through the mine-fields 
almost as rapidly as the British were putting new fields down; 
we could not prevent this, because protecting vessels could 
not remain so near the German bases without losses from 
submarine attacks. Moreover, the Germans also laid mines 
in the same area in order to trap the British mine-layers; and 
these operations resulted in very considerable losses on each 
side. These impediments made the egress of a submarine a 
difficult and nerve-racking process ; it sometimes required two 
or three days and the assistance of a dozen or so surface 
vessels to get a few submarines through the Heligoland Bight 
inta open waters. Several were unquestionably destroyed in 
the operation, yet the activity of submarines in the Atlantic 
showed that these mine-fields had by no means succeeded in 
proving more than a harassing measure. It was estimated 
that the North Sea barrage would require about 400,000 
mines, far more than existed in the world at that time, and 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 291 

far more than all our manufacturing resources could then 
produce within a reasonable period. I have already made the 
point, and I cannot make it too frequently, that time is often 
the essential element in war — and in this case it was of vital 
importance. Whether a programme is a wise one or not de- 
pends not only upon the feasibility of the plan itself, but upon 
the time and the circumstances in which it is proposed. In 
the spring of 19 17 the situation which we were facing was 
that the German submarines were destroying Allied shipping 
at the rate of nearly 800,000 tons a month. The one thing 
which was certain was that, if this destruction should con- 
tinue for four or five months, the Allies would be obliged to 
surrender unconditionally. The pressing problem was to 
find methods that would check these depredations and that 
would check them in time. The convoy system was the 
one naval plan — the point cannot be made too emphatically 
— which in April and May of 19 17 held forth the certainty 
of immediately accomplishing this result. Other methods 
of opposing the submarines were developed which magnifi- 
cently supplemented the convoy; but the convoy, at least in 
the spring and summer of 19 17, was the one sure method of 
salvation for the Allied cause. To have started the North 
Sea barrage in the spring and summer of 19 17 would have 
meant abandoning the convoy system ; and this would have 
been sheer madness. 

Thus in 1 9 1 7 the North Sea barrage was not an answer to the 
popular proposal "to dig the Germans out of their holes like 
rats." We did not have a mine which could be laid in such 
deep waters in sufficient numbers to have formed any barrier 
at all; and even if we had possessed one, the construction of 
the barrage would have demanded such an enormous number 
that they could not have been manufactured in time to 
finish the barrage until late in the year 19 18. Presently the 
situation began to change. The principal fact which made 
possible this great enterprise was the invention of an entirely 
new type of mine. The old mine consisted of a huge steel 



292 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

globe, filled with high explosive, which could be fired only by 
contact. That is, it was necessary for the surface of a ship, 
such as a submarine, to strike against the surface of the mine, 
and in this way start the mechanism which ignited the ex- 
plosive charge. The fact that this immediate contact was 
essential enormously increased the difficulty of successfully 
mining waters that range in depth from 400 to 900 feet. If 
the mines were laid anywhere near the surface, the submarine, 
merely by diving beneath them, could avoid all danger; if 
they were laid any considerable depth, it could sail with com- 
plete safety above them. Thus, if such a mine were to be 
used at all, we should have had to plant several layers, one 
under the other, down to a depth of about 250 feet, so that 
the submarine, at whatever depth it might be saiHng, would 
be likely to strike one of these obstructions. This required 
such a large number of mines as to render the whole project 
impossible. We Americans may take pride in the fact that 
it was an American who invented an entirely new type of 
mine and therefore solved this difficulty. In the summer of 
19 1 7 Mr. Ralph C. Browne, an electrical engineer of Salem, 
Mass., offered a submarine gun for the consideration of Com- 
mander S. P. FulHnwider, U. S. N., who was then in charge 
of the mining section of the Bureau of Ordnance. As a 
submarine gun this invention did not seem to offer many 
chances of success, but Commander FulHnwider realized 
that it comprised a firing device of excellent promise. The 
Bureau of Ordnance, assisted by Mr. Browne, spent the 
summer and fall experimenting with this contrivance and 
perfecting it ; the English mining officers who had been sent 
to America to cooperate with our navy expressed great 
enthusiasm over it ; and some time about the beginning of 
August, 19 1 7, the Bureau of Ordnance came to the conclusion 
that it was a demonstrated success. The details of Mr. 
Browne's invention are too intricate for description in this 
place, but its main point is comprehensible enough. Its 
great advantage was that it was not necessary for the sub- 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 293 

marine to strike the mine in order to produce the desired ex- 
plosion. The mine could be located at any depth and from 
it a long "antenna," a thin copper cable, reached up to within 
a few feet of the surface, where it was supported in that posi- 
tion by a small metal buoy. Any metallic substance, such 
as the hull of a submarine, simply by striking this antenna 
at any point, would produce an electric current, which, in- 
stantaneously transmitted to the mine, would cause this mine 
to explode. The great advantage of this device is at once ap- 
parent. Only about one fourth the number of mines required 
under the old conditions would now be necessary. The Min- 
ing Section estimated that 100,000 mines would form a 
barrier that would be extremely dangerous to submarines 
passing over it or through it, whereas, under the old condi- 
tions, about 400,000 would have been required. This im- 
plies more than a mere saving in manufacturing resources; 
it meant that we should need a proportionately smaller num- 
ber of mine-laying ships, crews, officers, bases, and supplies 
— all those things which are seldom considered by the ama- 
teur in warfare, but which are as essential to its prosecution 
as the more spectacular details. 

I wish to emphasize the fact that, in laying such a barrage, 
it was not our object to make an absolute barrier to the passage 
of submarines. To have done this we should have needed 
such a great number of mines that the operation would have 
been impossible. Nor would such an absolute barrier have 
been necessary to success; a field that could be depended upon 
to destroy one fourth or one fifth of the submarines that 
attempted the passage would have represented complete 
success. No enemy could stand such losses as these; and the 
morale of no crew could have lasted long under such con- 
ditions. 

Another circumstance which made the barrage a feasible 
enterprise was that by the last of the year 19 17 it was real- 
ized that the submarine had ceased to be a decisive factor in 
the war. It still remained a serious enbarrassment, and 



294 . THE VICTORY AT SEA 

every measure which could possibly thwart it should be 
adopted. But the writings of German officers which have 
been published since the war make it apparent that they 
themselves realized early in 19 18 that they would have to 
place their hopes of victory on something else besides the 
submarine. The convoy system and the other methods of 
fighting under-water craft which I have already described, 
had caused a great decrease in sinkings. In April of 19 17 the 
losses were nearly 900,000 tons; in November of the same 
year they were less than 300,000 tons.* Meanwhile, the 
construction of merchant shipping, largely a result of the 
tremendous expansion of American shipbuilding facilities, 
was increasing at a tremendous rate. A diagram of these, 
the two essential factors in the submarine campaign, disclosed 
such a rapidly rising curve of new shipping, and such a 
rapidly falling curve of sinkings, that the time could be easily 
foreseen when the net amount of Allied shipping, after the 
submarines had done their worst, would show a promising 
increase. But, as stated above, the submarines were still a 
distinct menace; they were still causing serious losses; and it 
was therefore very important that we should leave no stone 
unturned toward demonstrating beyond a shadow of doubt 
that warfare as conducted by these craft could be entirely 
put down. The more successfully we demonstrated this 
fact and the more energetically we prosecuted every form of 
opposition, the earlier would the enemy's general morale 
break down and victory be assured. In war, where human 
lives as well as national interests are at stake, no thought 
whatever can be given to expense. It is impossible to place 
a value on human Hfe. Therefore, on November 2, 19 17, 
the so-called "Northern Barrage" project was officially 
adopted by both the American and the British governments. 
When I say that the proposed mine-field was as long as the 
distance from Washington to New York, some idea of its 

*Complete statistics of shipping losses, new ship construction for 1917 and 1918, 
will be found in Appendices VI 11 and IX. 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 295 

magnitude may be obtained. Nothing like it had ever been 
attempted before. The combined operation involved a mass 
of detail which the lay mind can hardly comprehend. The 
cost — ^40,000,000 — is perhaps not an astonishing figure in 
the statistics of this war, but it gives some conception of the 
size of the undertaking. 

II 

DURING the two years preceding the war Captain 
Reginald R. Belknap commanded the mine-laying 
squadron of the Atlantic Fleet. Although his force was small, 
consisting principally of two antiquated warships, the 
Baltimore and the San Francisco, Captain Belknap had per- 
formed his duties conscientiously and ably, and his little 
squadron therefore gave us an excellent foundation on which 
to build. Before the European War the business of mine- 
laying had been unpopular in the American navy as well as 
in the British; such an occupation, as Sir Eric Geddes once 
said, had been regarded as something like that of "rat 
catching"; as hostilities went on, however, and the mine 
developed great value as an anti-submarine weapon, this 
branch of the service began to receive more respectful atten- 
tion. Captain Belknap's work not only provided the 
nucleus out of which the great American mine force was 
developed, but he was chiefly responsible for organizing this 
force. The "active front" of our mine-laying squadron was 
found in the North Sea; but the sources of supply lay in a 
dozen ship yards and several hundred manufacturing plants 
in the United States. 

We began this work with practically nothing; we had to 
obtain ships and transform them into mine-layers; to 
enlist and to train their crews; to manufacture at least 
100,000 mines; to create bases both in the United States 
and Scotland; to transport all of our supplies more than 
3,000 miles of wintry sea, part of the course lying in the 
submarine zone; and we had to do all this before the real 



296 ■ THE VICTORY AT SEA 

business of planting could begin. The fact that the Navy 
made contracts for 100,000 of these new mines before it had 
had the opportunity of thoroughly testing the design under 
service conditions shows the great faith of the Navy Depart- 
ment in this new invention. More than 500 contractors and 
sub-contractors, located in places as far west as the Missis- 
sippi River, undertook the work of filling this huge order. 
Wire-rope mills, steel factories, foundries, machine shops, 
electrical works, and even candy makers, engaged in this 
great operation; all had their troubles with labor unions, 
with the railroads, and with the weather — that was the 
terrible winter of 19 17-18; but in a few months trainloads of 
mine cases — great globes of steel — and other essential parts 
began to arrive at Norfolk, Virginia. This port was the 
place where the mine parts were loaded on ships and sent 
abroad. The plant which was ultimately constructed at this 
point was able to handle 1,000 mines a day; the industry was 
not a popular one in the neighborhood, particularly after the 
Halifax explosion had proved the destructive powers of the 
materials in which it dealt. In a few months this establish- 
ment had handled 25,000,000 pounds of TNT. The ex- 
plosive was melted in steel kettles until it reached about the 
density of hasty pudding; with the aid of automatic devices 
it was then poured into the mines cases, 300 pounds to a case, 
and thence moved on a mechanical conveyor to the end of 
the pier. Twenty-four cargo vessels, for the most part 
taken from the Great Lakes, carried these cargoes to the 
western coast of Scotland. Beginning in February, 19 18, 
two or three of these ships sailed every eight days from Nor- 
folk, armed against submarines and manned by naval crews. 
The fact that these vessels were slow made them an easy 
prey for the under-water enemy; one indeed was sunk, with 
the loss of forty-one men; regrettable as was this mishap, it 
represented the only serious loss of the whole expedition. 

The other vital points were Newport, Rhode Island, where 
the six mine-layers were assembled; and Fort William and 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 297 

Kyle of Loch Alsh on the western coast of Scotland, which 
were the disembarking points for the ships transporting the 
explosives. Captain Belknap's men were very proud of their 
mine-layers and in many details they represented an improve- 
ment over anything which had been hitherto employed in 
such a service. At this point I wish to express my very great 
appreciation of the loyal and devoted services rendered by 
Captain Belknap. An organizer of rare ability, this officer 
deserves well of the nation for the conspicuous part which he 
playedinthedevelopmentof the North Sea Mine Barrage from 
start to finish. Originally, these mine-layers had been coast- 
wise vessels; two of them were the Bunker Hill and the 
Massachusetts, which for years had been "outside line" 
boats, running from New York to Boston; all had dropped 
the names which had served them in civil life and were 
rechristened for the most part with names which eloquently 
testified to their American origin — Canonicus, Shawmut, 
Quinnehaug, Housatonic, Saranac, Roanoke, Aroostook, and 
Canandaigua. These changes in names were entirely suitable, 
for by the time our forces had completed their alterations 
the ships bore few resemblances to their former state. The 
cabins and saloons had been gutted, leaving the hulls little 
more than empty shells ; three decks for carrying mines had 
been installed; on all these decks little railroad tracks had 
been built on which the mines could be rolled along the lower 
decks to the elevators and along the upper mine deck to the 
stern and dropped into the sea. Particularly novel details, 
something entirely new in mine-layers, were the elevators, 
the purpose of which was to bring the mines rapidly from the 
lower decks to the launching track. So rapidly did the work 
progress, and so well were the crews trained, that, in May, 
19 18, the first of these ten ships weighed anchor and started 
for their destination in Scotland. Already our navy had 
selected as bases the ports of Inverness and Invergordon, on 
Moray Firth, harbors which were reasonably near the 
waters in which the mines were to be laid. From Inver- 



298 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

gordon the Highland Railway crosses Scotland to Loch Alsh, 
and from Inverness the Caledonian Canal runs to Fort 
William. These two transportation lines^ — the Highland 
Railway and the Caledonian Canal — served as connecting 
links in our communications. If we wish a complete picture 
of our operation, we must call to mind first the hundreds of 
factories in all parts of our country, working day and night, 
making the numerous parts of these instruments of destruc- 
tion and their attendant mechanisms; then hundreds of 
freight cars carrying them to the assembling plant at Norfolk, 
Virginia; then another small army of workmen at this point 
mixing their pasty explosive, heating it to a boiling point, and 
pouring the concoction into the spherical steel cases; then 
other groups of men moving the partially prepared mines to 
the docks and loading them on the cargo ships; then these 
ships quietly putting to sea, and, after a voyage of ten days 
or two weeks, as quietly slipping into the Scottish towns of 
Fort William and Kyle; then trains of freight cars and canal 
boats taking the cargoes across Scotland to Inverness and 
Invergordon, where the mines were completed and placed in 
the immense storehouses at the bases and loaded on the 
mine-layers as the necessity arose. Thus, when the whole 
organization was once established on a working basis, we had 
uninterrupted communications and a continuous flow of 
mines from the American factories to the stormy waters of 
the North Sea. 

The towns in which our officers and men found themselves 
in late May, 1918, are among the most famous in Scottish 
history and legend. Almost every foot of land is associated 
with memories of Macbeth, Mary Queen of Scots, Cromwell, 
and the Pretender. "The national anthem woke me/' says 
Captain Belknap, describing his first morning at his n&w 
Scottish base. " I arose and looked out. What a glorious 
sight ! Green slopes in all freshness, radiant with broom and 
yellow gorse; the rocky shore mirrored in the Firth, which 
stretched, smooth and cool, wide away to the east and south; 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 299 

and, in the distance, snow-capped Ben Wy vis. Lying off the 
entrance to Munlochy Bay, we had a view along the sloping 
shores into the interior of Black Isle, of noted fertility. 
Farther out were Avoch, a whitewashed fishing village, and 
the ancient town.of Fortrose, with its ruined Twelfth Century 
cathedral. Across the Firth lay Culloden House, where 
Bonnie Prince Charlie slept before the battle. Substantial, 
but softened in outline by the morning haze, the Royal 
Burgh of Inverness covered the banks and heights along the 
Ness River, gleaming in the bright sunshine. And how 
peaceful everywhere! The Canandaigua and the Sonoma 
lay near by, the Canonicus farther out, but no movement, no 
signal, no beat of the engine, no throbbing pumps." The 
reception which the natives gave our men was as delightful 
as the natural beauty of the location. For miles around the 
Scots turned out to make things pleasant for their Yankee 
guests. The American naval forces stationed at the mining 
bases in those two towns numbered about 3,000 officers and 
men, and the task of providing relaxations, in the heart of the 
Highlands, far removed from theatres and moving picture 
houses, would have been a serious one had it not been for the 
cordial cooperation of the people. The spirit manifested 
during our entire stay was evidenced on the Fourth of July, 
when all the shops and business places closed in honor of 
American Independence Day and the whole community for 
miles around joined our sailors in the celebration. The 
officers spent such periods of relaxation as were permitted 
them on the excellent golf links and tennis courts in the 
adjoining country; dances were provided for the men, almost 
every evening, the Scottish lassies showing great adaptability 
in learning the American steps. Amateur theatricals, in 
which both the men from the warships and the Scottish girls 
took part, cheered many a crew after its return from the 
mine-fields. Baseball was introduced for the first time into 
the country of William Wallace and Robert Burns. Great 
crowds gathered to witness the matches between the several 



300 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

ships; the Scots quickly learned the fine points and really 
developed into "fans," while the small boys of Inverness and 
Invergordon were soon playing the game with as much 
enthusiasm and cleverness as our own youngsters at home. 
In general, the behavior of our men was excellent and made 
the most favorable impression. 

These two mine-assembly bases at Inverness and Inver- 
gordon will ever remain a monumental tribute to the loyal 
and energetic devotion to duty of Captain Orin G. Murfm, 
U. S. Navy, who designed and built them; originally the 
bases were intended to handle 12,000 mines, but in reality 
Captain Murfm successfully handled as many as 20,000 at 
one time. It was here also that each secret firing device was 
assembled and installed, very largely by reserve personnel. 
As many as 1,200 mines were assembled in one day, which 
speaks very eloquently for the foresight with which Captain 
Murfm planned his bases. 

Ill 

BUT of course baseball and dancing were not the 
serious business in hand; these Americans had come 
this long distance to do their part in laying the mighty 
barrage which was to add one more serious obstacle to the 
illegal German submarine campaign. Though the operation 
was a joint one of the American and British navies, our part 
was much the larger. The proposal was to construct 
this explosive impediment from the Orkney Islands to the 
coast of Norway, in the vicinity of Udsire Light, a distance 
of about 230 nautical miles. Of this great area about 150 
miles, extending from the Orkneys to 3 degrees east longi- 
tude, was the American field,. and the eastern section, which 
extended fifty nautical miles to Norway, was taken over by 
the British. Since an operation of this magnitude required 
the supervision of an officer of high rank, Rear-Admiral 
Joseph Strauss, who had extended experience in the ordnance 
field of the navy, came over in March, 19 18, and took com- 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 301 

mand. The British commander was Rear-Admiral Clinton- 
Baker, R. N. 

The mines were laid in a series of thirteen expeditions, or 
"excursions," as our men somewhat cheerfully called them. 
The ten mine-layers participated in each "excursion," all ten 
together laying about 5,400 mines at every trip. Each trip 
to the field of action was practically a duplicate of the others; 
a description of one will, therefore, serve for all. After days, 
and sometimes after weeks of preparation the squadron, 
usually on a dark and misty night, showing no lights or 
signals, would weigh anchor, slip by the rocky palisades of 
Moray Firth, and stealthily creep out to sea. As the ships 
passed through the nets and other obstructions and reached 
open waters, the speed increased, the gunners took their 
stations at their batteries, and suddenly from a dark horizon 
came a group of low, rapidly moving vessels; these were the 
British destroyers from the Grand Fleet which had been sent 
to escort the expedition and protect it from submarines. The 
absolute silence of the whole proceeding was impressive; not 
one of the destroyers showed a signal or a light ; not one of the 
mine-layers gave the slightest sign of recognition; all these 
details had been arranged in advance, and everything now 
worked with complete precision. The swishing of the 
water on the sides and the slow churning of the propellers 
were the only sounds that could possibly betray the ships to 
their hidden enemies. After the ships had steamed a few 
more miles the dawn began to break; and now a still more 
inspiring sight met our men. A squadron of battleships, 
with scout cruisers and destroyers, suddenly appeared over 
the horizon. This fine force likewise swept -on, apparently 
paying not the slightest attention to our vessels. They 
steamed steadily southward, and in an hour or so had entirely 
disappeared. The observer would hardly have guessed that 
this squadron from Admiral Beatty's fleet at Scapa Flow had 
anything to do with the American and British mine-layers. 
Its business, however, was to establish a wall of steel and 



302 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

shotted guns between these forces and the German battle 
fleet at Kiel. At one time it was believed that the mine 
forces on the northern barrage would prove a tempting bait 
to the German dreadnaughts; and that, indeed, it might in- 
duce the enemy to risk a second general engagement on the 
high seas. At any rate, a fleet of converted excursion 
steamers, laying mines in the North Sea, could hardly be left 
exposed to the attacks of German raiders; our men had the 
satisfaction of knowing that while engaged in their engrossing 
if unenviable task a squadron of British or American battle- 
ships — ^for Admiral Rodman's forces took their regular turn in 
acting as a "screen" in these excursions — was standing a 
considerable distance to the south, prepared to make things 
lively for any German surface vessels which attempted to 
interfere with the operation. 

Now in the open seas the ten mine-layers formed in two 
columns, abreast of each other and five hundred yards apart, 
and started for the waters of the barrage. Twelve destroyers 
surrounded them, on the lookout for submarines, for the 
ships were now in the track of the U-boats bound for their 
hunting ground or returning to their home ports. At a 
flash from the flagship all slackened speed, and put out their 
paravanes — those under-water outrigger affairs which pro- 
tected the ships from mines; forjt was not at all unlikely that 
the Germans would place some of their own mines in this 
field, for the benefit of the barrage builders. This operation 
took only a few minutes ; then another flash, and the squadron 
again increased its speed. It steamed the distance across 
the North Sea to Udsire Light, then turned west again and 
headed for that mathematical spot on the ocean which was 
known as the "start point" — the place, that is, where the 
mine-laying was to begin. In carrying out all these ma- 
noeuvres — sighting the light on the Norwegian coast — the 
commander was thinking, not only of the present, but of the 
future; for the time would come, after the war had ended, 
when it would be necessary to remove all these mines, and it 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 303 

was therefore wise to "fix" them as accurately as possible in 
reference to landmarks, so as to know where to look for 
them. All this time the men were at their stations, examin- 
ing the mines to see that everything was ready, testing the 
laying mechanisms, and mentally rehearsing their duties. At 
about four o'clock an important signal came from the flag- 
ship : 

"Have everything ready, for the squadron will reach 
'start point' in an hour and mine-laying will begin." 

Up to this time the ships were sailing in two columns; when 
they came within seven miles of "start point," another signal 
was broken out; the ships all wheeled like a company of sol- 
diers, each turning sharply to the right, so that in a few 
minutes, instead of two columns, we had eight ships in line 
abreast, with the remaining two, also in line abreast, sailing 
ahead of them. This splended array, keeping perfect position, 
approached the starting point like a line of racehorses 
passing under the wire. Not a ship was off this line by so 
much as a quarter length; the whole atmosphere was one of 
eagerness; the officers all had their eyes fixed upon the stern 
of the flagship, for the glimpse of the red flag which would be 
the signal to begin. Suddenly the flag was hauled down, 
indicating: 

"First mine over." 

If you had been following one of these ships, you would 
probably have been surprised at the apparent simplicity of 
the task. The vessel was going at its full speed; at intervals 
of a few seconds a huge black object, about five feet high, 
would be observed gliding toward the stern; at this point it 
would pause for a second or two, as though suspended in air; 
it would then give a mighty lurch, fall head first into the 
water, sending up a great splash, and then sink beneath the 
waves. By the time the disturbance was over the ship 
would have advanced a considerable distance; then, in a few 
seconds, another black object would roll toward the stern, 
make a similar plunge, and disappear. You might have 



304 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

followed the same ship for two or three hours, watching these 
mines fall overboard at intervals of about fifteen seconds. 
There were four planters, each of which could and did on 
several trips lay about 860 mines in three hours and thirty- 
five minutes, in a single line about forty-four miles long. 
These were the Canandaigua, the Canonicus, the Housatonic, 
and the Roanoke. Occasionally the monotony of this 
procedure would be enlivened by a terrible explosion, a great 
geyser of water rising where a mine had only recently dis- 
appeared; this meant that the "egg," as the sailors called it, 
had gone off spontaneously, without the assistance of any 
external contact; such accidents were part of the game, the 
records showing that about 4 per cent, of all the mines in- 
dulged in such initial premature explosions. For the most 
part, however, nothing happened to disturb the steady 
mechanical routine. The mines went over with such regu- 
larity that, to an observer, the whole proceeding seemed 
hardly the work of human agency. Yet every detail had 
been arranged months before in the United States; the mines 
fell into the sea in accordance with a time table which had 
been prepared in Newport before the vessels started for 
Scotland. Every man on the ship had a particular duty to 
perform and each performed it in the way in which he had 
been schooled under the direction of Captain Belknap. 

The spherical mine case, which contains the explosive 
charge and the mechanism for igniting it, is only a part of 
the contrivance. While at rest on board the ship this case 
stands upon a box-like affair, about two feet square, known 
as the anchor; this anchor sinks to the bottom after launch- 
ing and it contains an elaborate arrangement for maintaining 
the mine at any desired depth beneath the surface. The 
bottom of the "anchor" has four wheels, on which it runs 
along the little railroad track on the launching deck to the 
jumping-off place at the stem. All along these railroad 
tracks the mines were stationed one back of another; as 
one went overboard, they would all advance a peg, a mine 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 305 

coming up from below on an elevator to fill up the vacant 
space at the end of the procession. It took a crew.of hard- 
working, begrimed, and sweaty men to keep these mines mov- 
ing and going over the stern at the regularly appointed 
intervals. After three or four hours had been spent in this 
way and the ships had started back to their base, the decks 
would sometimes be covered with the sleeping figures of 
these exhausted men. It would be impossible to speak too 
appreciatively of the spirit they displayed; in the whole 
summer there was not a single mishap of any importance. 
The men all felt that they were engaged in a task which had 
never been accomplished before, and their exhilaration in- 
creased with almost every mine that was laid. "Nails 
in the coifin of the Kaiser," the men called these grim in- 
struments of vengeance. 

IV 

I HAVE described one of these thirteen summer excursions, 
and the description given could be applied to all the rest. 
Once or twice the periscope of a submarine was sighted — 
without any disastrous results — but in the main this busi- 
ness of mine-laying was uneventful. Just what was accom- 
pHshed the chart makes clear. In the summer and fall 
months of 19 18 the American forces laid 56,571 mines and 
the British 13,546. The operation was to have been a 
continuous one; had the war gone on for two years we should 
probably have laid several hundred thousand; Admiral 
Strauss's forces kept at the thing steadily up to the time of 
the armistice; they had become so expert and the barrage 
was producing such excellent results that we had plans 
nearly completed for building another at the Strait of 
Otranto, which would have completely closed the Adriatic 
Sea. Besides this undertaking the American mine-layer 
Baltimore laid a mine-field in the North Irish Channel, the 
narrow waters which separate Scotland and Ireland; two 
German submarines which soon afterward attempted this 



3o6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

passage were blown to pieces, and after this the mine-field 
was given a wide berth. 

Just what the North Sea barrage accomplished, in the 
acutal destruction of submarines, will never be definitely 
known. We have information that four certainly were 
destroyed, and in all probability six and possibly eight ; yet 
these results doubtless measure only a small part of the 
German losses. In the majority of cases the Germans had 
little or no evidence of sunken submarines. The de- 
stroyers, subchasers, and other patrol boats were usually 
able to obtain some evidences of injury inflicted; they could 
often see their quarry, or the disturbances which it made 
on the surface; they could pursue and attack it, and the 
resultant oil patches, wreckage, and German prisoners — and 
sometimes the recovered submarine itself or its location on 
the bottom — would tell the story either of damage or destruc- 
tion. But the disconcerting thing about the North Sea 
barrage, from the viewpoint of the Germans, was that it 
could do its work so secretly that no one, friend or enemy, 
would necessarily know a thing about it. A German submarine 
simply left its home port ; attempting to cross the barrage, 
perhaps at night, it would strike one of these mines, or its 
antenna; an explosion would crumple it up like so much paper; 
with its crew it would sink to the bottom; and not a soul, 
perhaps not even the crew itself, would ever know what had 
happened to it. It would in truth be a case of "sinking with- 
out a trace " — though an entirely legitimateoneunder the rules 
of warfare. The German records disclosed anywhere from 
forty to fifty submarines sunk which did not appear in the 
records of the Allies; how these were destroyed not a soul 
knows, or ever will know. They simply left their German 
ports and were never heard of again. That many of them 
fell victims to mines, and some of them to the mines of our 
barrage, is an entirely justifiable assumption. That prob- 
ably even a larger number of U-boats were injured is also 
true. A German submarine captain, after the surrender at 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 307 

Scapa Flow, said that he personally knew of three sub- 
marines, including his own, which had been so badly injured 
at the barrage that they had been compelled to limp back 
to their German ports. 

The results other than the sinking of submarines were 
exceedingly important in bringing the war to an end. It 
was the failure of the submarine campaign which defeated 
the German hopes and forced their surrender; and in this 
defeat the barrage was an important element. That sub- 
marines frequently crossed it is true; there was no expecta- 
tion, when the enterprise was started, that it would ab- 
solutely shut the U-boats in the North Sea; but its influence 
in breaking down the German morale must have been great. 
To understand this, just place yourself for a moment in the 
position of a submarine crew. The width of this barrage 
ranged from fifteen to thirty-five miles; it took from one to 
three hours for a submarine to cross this area on the surface 
and from two to six hours under the surface. Not every square 
foot, it is true, had been mined ; there were certain gaps caused 
by the spontaneous explosions to which I have referred; but 
nobody knew where these openings were, or where a single 
mine was located. The officers and crews knew only that 
at any moment an explosion might send them to eternity. 
A strain of this sort is serious enough if it lasts only a few 
minutes; imagine being kept in this state of mind anywhere 
from one to six hours ! Submarine prisoners constantly told 
us how they dreaded the mines; going through such a field, I 
suppose, was about the most disagreeable experience in this 
nerve-racking service. Our North Sea barrage began to 
show results almost immediately after our first planting. The 
German officers evidently kept informed of our progress 
and had a general idea of the territory which had been 
covered. For a considerable time a passageway, sixty 
miles wide, was kept open for the Grand Fleet just east of 
the Orkney Islands; the result was that the submarines, 
which had hitherto usually skirted the Norwegian coast. 



3o8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

now changed their route, and attempted to sHp through 
the western passageway — a course that enabled them to 
avoid the mine-field. When the entire distance from the 
Orkneys to Norway had been mined, however, it became 
impossible to "run around the end." The Germans were 
now obliged to sail boldly into this explosive field, taking 
their chances of hitting a mine. Stories of this barrage 
were circulated all over Germany; sailors who had been in 
contact with it related their experiences to their fellows; 
and the result was extremely demoralizing to the German 
submarine flotilla. The North Sea barrage was probably 
a contributory cause of the mutiny which demoralized the 
German fleet in the fall of 191 8. 

i think I am therefore justified in saying that this enter- 
prise was a strong factor in overcoming the submarine 
menace, though the success of the convoy system had already 
brought the end in sight, and had thus made it practicable 
to assign, without danger of defeat, the tonnage necessary 
to lay the barrage and maintain and augment it as long as 
might be necessary. The Germans saw the barrage not 
only as it was in the fall of 19 18, but as it would be a few 
months or a year hence. We had started a steady stream of 
mines from hundreds of factories in the United States to our 
Scottish bases; these establishments were constantly in- 
creasing production, and there was practically no limit to 
their possible output. We had developed a mine-laying 
organization which was admittedly better than any that had 
been hitherto known; and this branch of the service we could 
now enlarge indefinitely. In time we could have planted 
this area so densely with explosives that it would have been 
madness for any submarines even to attempt a passage. 
To be sure, the Pentland Firth, between the Orkneys and 
Scotland, was always open, and could not be mined on ac- 
count of its swift tides, but besides being a dangerous passage 
at best it was constantly patrolled to make it still more 
dangerous. 



THE AMERICAN MINE BARRAGE 309 

The loyal devotion to duty, and the skilful seamanship 
which our officers displayed in this great enterprise were not 
only thoroughly in keeping with the highest traditions of the 
Navy but really established new standards to guide and 
inspire those who will follow us. These gallant officers who 
actually laid the mines are entitled to the nation's gratitude 
and I take great pleasure in commending the work of Cap- 
tain H. V. Butler, commanding the flagship San Francisco; 
Captain J. Harvey Tomb, commanding the Aroostook; Cap- 
tain A. W. Marshall, commanding the Baltimore; Comman- 
der W. H. Reynolds, comm3.ndmgtheCanandaigua; Captain 
T. L. Johnson, commanding the Canonicus; Captain J. W. 
Greenslade, commanding the Housatonic; Commander D. 
Pratt Mannix, commanding the Quinnebaug; Captain C. D. 
Stearns, commanding the Roanoke; Captain Sinclair Gannon, 
commanding the Saranac; and Captain W. T. Cluverius, 
commanding the Shawmut. 

This splendid squadron, of which the flagship was the 
San Francisco, was organized by Captain R. R. Belknap and, 
by order of the Secretary of the Navy, was placed under his 
direct command; and he was therefore responsible for all 
preparations, tactics, general instructions, special instruc- 
tions for each mine-laying "excursion," the intricate naviga- 
tion required, and in fact all arrangements necessary for the 
successful planting of the mines in their assigned positions. 



CHAPTER X 

GERMAN SUBMARINES VISIT THE 
AMERICAN COAST 

'TWAS in the summer of 19 18 that the Germans made their 
only attempt at what might be called an offensive against 
their American enemies. Between the beginning of May 
and the end of October, 19 18, five German submarines 
crossed the Atlantic and torpedoed a few ships on our coast. 
That submarines could make this long journey had long been 
known. Singularly enough, however, the impression still 
prevails in this country that the German U-boats were the 
first to accomplish the feat. In the early fall of 19 16 the 
L/-5J — commanded by that submarine officer, Hans Rose, 
who has been mentioned in these pages — crossed the 
Atlantic, dropped in for a call at Newport, R. I., and, on 
the way back, sank a few merchant vessels off Nantucket. 
A few months previous the so-called merchant submarine 
Deutschland had made its trip to Newport News. The 
Teutonic press, and even some Germanophiles in this coun- 
try, hailed these achievements as marking a glorious 
page in the record of the German navy. Doubtless the real 
purpose was to show the American people how easily these 
destructive vessels could cross the Atlantic; and to impress 
upon their minds th& fate which awaited them in case they 
maintained their rights against the Prussian bully. As a 
matter of fact, it had been proved, long before the Deutsch- 
land or the V-^3 had made their voyages, that submarines 
could cross the Atlantic. In 191 5, not one but ten sub- 
marines had gone from North America to Europe under their 

310 



SUBMARINES VISIT AMERICA 311 

own power. Admiral Sir John Fisher tells about this ex- 
pedition in his recently published memoirs. In 19 14, the 
British Admiralty had contracted for submarines with 
Charles M. Schwab, president of the Bethlehem Steel 
Company. As international law prohibited the construction 
of war vessels by a nation in wartime for the use of a belli- 
gerent with which it was at peace, the parts of ten sub- 
marines were sent to Canada, where they were put together. 
These submarines then crossed the Atlantic under their own 
power, and were sent from British ports to the Dardanelles, 
where they succeeded in driving Turkish and German ship- 
ping out of the Sea of Marmora. Thus a crossing of the 
Atlantic by American-built submarines manned by British 
crews had been accomplished before the Germans made their 
voyages. It was therefore not necessary for the two Ger- 
man submarines to cross the Atlantic to prove that the thing 
could be done; but the Germans doubtless believed that this 
demonstration of their ability to operate on the American 
coast would serve as a warning to the American people. 

We were never at all deceived as to what would be the 
purpose of such a visit after our entrance into the war. In 
the early part of 19 17 the Allies believed that a few German 
U-boats might assail our coast, and I so informed the Navy 
Department at Washington. My cables and letters of 19 17 
explained fully the reasons why Germany might indulge in 
such a gesture. Strategically, as these despatches make 
clear, such attacks would have no great military value. To 
have sent a sufficient number of submarines to do any con- 
siderable damage on the American coast would have been a 
great mistake. Germany's one chance of winning the war 
with the submarine weapon was to destroy shipping to such 
an extent that the communications of the Allies with the 
outside world, and especially with the United States, would 
be cut. The only places where the submarine warfare could 
be conducted with some chance of success were the ocean 
passage routes which lead to European ports, especially in 



312 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

that area south and southwest of Ireland in which were 
focussed the trade routes for ships sailing from all parts of the 
world and destined for British and French ports. With the 
number of submarines available, the Germans could keep 
enough of their U-boats at work in these areas to destroy a 
large number of merchant ships. Germany thus needed to 
concentrate all of her available submarines at these points ; she 
had an inadequate number for her purpose; to send any con- 
siderable force three thousand miles across the Atlantic would 
simply weaken her efforts in the real scene of warfare and 
would make her submarine campaign a failure. The cruises 
of submarines on the American coast would have been very 
much longer and would have been a much more serious 
strain on the submarines than were the shorter cruises in the 
inshore waters of Europe. As has already been explained, 
the submarine did not differ from other craft in its need for 
constant repairs and careful upkeep, except that perhaps it 
was a more delicate instrument of warfare than any other 
naval craft, and that it would require longer and more fre- 
quent periods of overhaul. Any operations carried out 
three thousand miles from their bases, where alone supplies, 
spare parts, and repair facilities were available, would have 
soon reduced the submarine campaign to comparative use- 
lessness; each voyage would have resulted in sinking a 
relatively small amount of shipping; a greater number of 
submarines would be out of commission at all times for re- 
pairs, or would be lost through accidents. The Germans had 
no submarine bases in American waters and could establish 
none. Possibly, as the newspaper writer has pointed out, 
they might have seized a deserted island off the coast of 
Maine or in the Caribbean, and cached there a reservoir of 
fuel and food; unless, however, they could also have created 
at these places adequate facilities for repairing submarines 
or supplying them with torpedoes and ammunition, such 
a place would not have served the purpose of a base at all. 
Comparatively few of the German submarines could have 



SUBMARINES VISIT AMERICA 313 

made the cruise to the American coast and operated success- 
fully there so far away from their bases for any considerable 
time. In the time spent in such an enterprise, the same sub- 
marine could make three or four trips in the waters about the 
British Isles, or off the coast of France, and could sink four or 
five times the tonnage which could be destroyed in the cruise 
on the Atlantic coast. In the eastern Atlantic, the submarine 
could seek its victims in an area comprising a comparatively 
few square miles, at points where shipping was so dense that 
a submarine had only to take a station and lie in wait, and 
be certain, within a short time, of encountering valuable 
ships which it could attack successfully with its torpedoes. 
If the U-boats should be sent to America, on the other 
hand, they would have to patrol up and down three thousand 
miles of coast, looking for victims; and even when they found 
them the ships that they could sink would usually be those 
engaged in the coastwise traffic, which were of infinitely less 
military importance than the transports which were carrying 
food, munitions, and supplies to the Allies and which were 
being sunk in the eastern Atlantic. 

Anything resembling an attack in force on American har- 
bors was therefore improbable. Yet it seemed likely from 
the first that the Germans would send an occasional sub- 
marine into our waters, as a measure of propaganda rather 
than for the direct military result that would be achieved. 
American destroyers and other vessels were essential to the 
success of the whole anti-submarine campaign of the Allies. 
The sooner they could all be sent into the critical European 
waters the sooner the German campaign of terrorism would 
end. If these destroyers, or any considerable part of them, 
could be kept indefinitely in American waters, the Germans 
might win the war. Any manoeuvre which would have as 
its result the keeping of these American vessels, so indispen- 
sable to the Allies, out of the field of active warfare, would 
thus be more than justified and, indeed, would indicate the 
highest wisdom on the part of the German navy. The 



314 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Napoleonic principle of dividing your enemy's forces is just 
as valuable in naval as in land warfare. For many years 
Admiral Mahan had been instructing American naval officers 
that the first rule in warfare is not to divide your fighting 
forces, but always to keep them together, so as to bring the 
whole weight at a given moment against your adversary. 
Two of the fundamental principles of the science of warfare, 
on land and sea alike, are contained in the maxims: Keep 
your own forces concentrated, and always endeavor to divide 
those of the enemy. Undoubtedly, the best method which 
Germany could use to keep our destroyers in our own waters 
would be to make the American people believe that their 
lives and property were in danger; they might accomplish 
this by sending a submarine to attack our shipping off New 
York and Boston and other Atlantic seaports, and possibly 
even to bombard our harbors. The Germans doubtless 
believed that they might create such alarm and arouse such 
public clamor in the United States that our destroyers and 
other anti-submarine craft would be kept over here by the 
Navy Department, in response to the popular agitation to 
protect our own coast. This is the reason why American 
headquarters in London, and the Allied admiralties, expected 
such a visitation. The Germans obviously endeavored 
to create the impression that such an attack was likely to 
occur at any time. This was part of their war propaganda. 
The press was full of reports that such attacks were about 
to be made. German agents were continually circulating 
these reports. 

Of course it was clear from the first, to the heads of the 
Allied navies and to all naval authorities who were informed 
about the actual conditions, that these attacks by German 
submarines on the American coast would be in the nature 
of raids for moral effect only. It was also quite clear from 
the first, as I pointed out in my despatches to the Navy 
Department, that the best place to defend our coast was in 
the critical submarine areas in the European Atlantic, through 



SUBMARINES VISIT AMERICA 315 

which the submarines had to pass in setting out for our coast, 
and in which alone they could have any hope of succeeding 
in the military object of the undersea campaign. It was 
not necessary to keep our destroyers in American waters, 
patrolling the vast expanse of our three thousand miles of 
coastline, in a futile effort to fmd and destroy such enemy 
submarines as might operate on the American coast. So 
long as these attacks were only sporadic — and carried out by 
the type of submarine which used its guns almost exclusively 
in sinking ships, and which selected for its victims unarmed 
and unprotected ships — destroyers and other anti-submarine 
craft would be of no possible use on the Atlantic coast. The 
submarine could see these craft from a much greater distance 
than it could itself be seen by them; and by diving and sailing 
submerged it could easily avoid them and sink its victims 
without ever being sighted or attacked by our own patrols, 
however numerous they might have been. Even in the 
narrow waters of the English Channel, up to the very end of 
the war, submarines were successfully attacking small mer- 
chant craft by gunfire, although the density of patrol craft 
in this area was naturally a thousand times greater than 
we could ever have provided for the vast expanse of our own 
coast. Consequently, so long as the submarine attacks on 
the American coast were only sporadic, it was absolutely 
futile to maintain patrol craft in those waters, as this could 
not provide any adequate defence against such scattered 
demonstrations. If, on the other hand, the Germans had 
ever decided to commit the military mistake of concentrating 
a considerable number of submarines off our Atlantic ports, 
we could always have countered such a step by sending back 
from the war zone an adequate number of craft to protect 
convoys in and out of the Atlantic ports, in the same manner 
that convoys were protected in the submarine danger zone 
in European waters. This is a fact which even many naval 
men did not seem to grasp. Yet I have already explained 
that we knew practically where every German submarine 



3i6 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

was at any given time. We knew whenever one left a German 
port; and we kept track of it day by day until it returned 
home. No U-boat ever made a voyage across the Atlantic 
without our knowledge. The submarine was a slow traveller, 
and required a minimum of thirty days for such a trip; 
normally, the time would be much longer, for a submarine 
on such a long voyage has to economize oil fuel for the return 
trip and therefore seldom cruised at more than five knots an 
hour. Our destroyers and anti-submarine craft, on the other 
hand, could easily cross the Atlantic in ten days and refuel 
in their home ports. It is therefore apparent that a flotilla 
of destroyers stationed in European waters could protect the 
American coast from submarines almost as successfully as 
if it were stationed at Hampton Roads or Newport. Such 
a flotilla would be of no use at these American stations unless 
there were submarines attacking shipping off the coast; but 
as soon as the Germans started for America — a fact of which 
we could always be informed, and of which, as I shall explain, 
we always were informed — we could send our destroyers 
in advance of them. These agile vessels would reach home 
waters about three weeks before the submarines arrived; 
they would thus have plenty of time to refit and to welcome 
the uninvited guests. From any conceivable point of view, 
therefore, there was no excuse for keeping destroyers on the 
American side of the Atlantic for "home defence." More- 
over, the fact that we could keep this close track of sub- 
marines in itself formed a great protection against them. 
I have already explained how we routed convoys entering 
European waters in such ways that they could sail around 
the U-boat and thus escape contact. I think that this 
simple procedure saved more shipping than any other method. 
In the same way we could keep these vessels sailing from 
American ports outside of the area in which the submarines 
were known to be operating in our own waters. 

Yet the enemy sent no submarines to our coast in 1917; 
why they did not do so may seem difficult to understand, for 



SUBMARINES VISIT AMERICA 317 

that was just the period when a campaign of this kind might 
have served their purpose. During this time, however, we 
had repeated indications that the Germans did not take 
the American entrance into the war very seriously; moreover, 
looking forward to conditions, after the peace, they perhaps 
hoped that they might soon be able once again to establish 
friendly relations. In 19 17 they therefore refrained from 
any acts which might arouse popular hatred against them. 
We had more than one indication of this attitude. Early 
in the summer of 19 17 we obtained from one of the captured 
German submarines a set of the orders issued to it by the 
German Admiralty Staff. Among these was one dated 
May 8, 19 17, in which the submarine commanders were in- 
formed that Germany had not declared war upon the United 
States, and that, until further instructions were received, 
the submarines were to continue to look upon America and 
American shipping as neutral. The submarine commanders 
were especially warned against attacking or committing any 
overt act against such American war-vessels as might be 
encountered in European waters. The orders explained that 
no official confirmation had been received by the German 
Government of the news which had been published in the 
press that America had declared war, and that, therefore, 
the Germans, officially, were ignoring our belligerence. From 
their own standpoint such a policy of endeavoring not to 
offend America, even after she became an enemy, may 
have seemed politically wise; from a military point of view, 
their failure to attempt the submarine demonstration off our 
coast in 19 17 was a great mistake; for when they finally 
started warfare on our coast, the United States was deeply 
involved in hostilities, and had already begun the transporta- 
tion of the great army which produced such decisive results 
on the Western Front, The time had passed, as experience 
soon showed, when any demonstration on our coast would 
disturb the calm of the American people or affect their 
will to victory. 



3i8 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

In late April, 19 18, I learned through secret-service chan- 
nels that one of the large submarines of the Deutschland 
class had left its German base on the 19th of April for a long 
cruise. On the first of May, 19 18, I therefore cabled to the 
Department that there were indications that this submarine 
was bound for our own coast. A few days afterward I re- 
ceived more specific information, through the interception of 
radio despatches between Germany and the submarine; and 
therefore I cabled the Department, this time informing them 
that the submarine was the U-i^i, that it was now well on 
its way across the Atlantic, and that it could be expected to 
begin operations off the American coast any time after May 
20th. I gave a complete description of the vessel, the 
probable nature of her cruise, and her essential military 
characteristics. She carried a supply of mines, and I there- 
fore invited the attention of the Department to the fact 
that the favorite areas for laying mines were those places 
where the ships stopped to pick up pilots. Since at Dela- 
ware Bay pilots for large ships were taken on just south of 
the Five Fathom Bank Light, I suggested that it was not 
unlikely that the U-i^i would attempt to lay mines in that 
vicinity. Now the fact is that we knew that the U-i^i 
intended to lay mines at this very place. We had obtained this 
piece of information from the radio which we had intercepted; 
as there was a possibility that our own cable might fall into 
German hands, we did not care to give the news in the 
precise form in which we had received it, as we did not 
intend that they should know that we had means of keeping 
so accurately informed. As had been predicted, the U-i^i 
proceeded directly to the vicinity of this Five Fathom Bank off 
Delaware Bay, laid her mines, and then, cruising northward 
up the coast, began her demonstration on the 25th of May by 
sinking two small wooden schooners. These had no radio 
apparatus and it was not until June 2nd that the Navy 
Department and the country received the news that the first 
submarine was operating. On June 29th I informed Wash- 



SUBMARINES VISIT AMERICA 319 

ington that another U-boat was then coming down the west 
coast of Ireland, bound for the United States, and that it 
would arrive some time after July 15th. Complete reports 
of this vessel were sent from day to day, as it made its slow 
progress across the ocean. On July 6th I cabled that still 
another U-boat had started for our coast ; and the progress of 
this adventurer, with all details as to its character and prob- 
able area of operations, were also forwarded regularly. From 
the end of May until October there was nearly always one 
submarine operating off our coast. The largest number 
active at any one time was in August, when for a week or ten 
days three were more or less active in attacking coastwise 
vessels. These three operated all the way from Cape Hat- 
teras to Newfoundland, attempting by these tactics to create 
the impression that dozens of hostile U-boats were preying 
upon our commerce and threatening our shores. These 
submarines, however, attacked almost exclusively sailing 
vessels and small coastwise steamers, rarely, if ever, using 
torpedoes. A number of mines were laid at different points 
off our ports, on what the Germans believed to be the traffic 
routes; but the information which we had concerning them 
made it possible to counter successfully their efforts and, 
from a military point of view, the whole of the submarine 
operations off our coast can be dismissed as one of the minor 
incidents of the war, as the Secretary of the Navy described 
it in his Annual Report. The, five submarines sunk in all 
approximately 110,000 tons of shipping, but the vessels 
were, for the most part, small and of no great military im- 
portance. The only real victory was the destruction of the 
cruiser San Diego, which was sunk by a mine which had been 
laid by the U'i^6 off Fire Island. 




CHAPTER XI 

FIGHTING SUBMARINES FROM 
THE AIR 

UT the Allied navies were harrowing the submarines 
not only under the water and on the surface, but 
from the air. In the anti-submarine campaign 
the several forms of aircraft — airplane, seaplane, 
dirigible, and kite balloon — developed great offensive power. 
Nor did the fact that our fighters in the heavens made 
few direct attacks which were successful diminish the import- 
ance of their work. The records of the British Admiralty 
attribute the destruction of five submarines to the British 
air service; the French Admiralty gives the American forces 
credit for destroying one on the French coast. These 
achievements, compared with the tremendous efforts in- 
volved in equipping air stations, may at first look like an 
inconsiderable return; yet the fact remains that aircraft 
were an important element in defeating the German cam- 
paign against merchant shipping. 

Like the subchaser and the submarine, the seaplane 
operated most successfully in coastal waters. I have already 
indicated that one advantage of the convoy system was that 
it forced the U-boats to seek their victims closer to the shore. 
In our several forms of aircraft we had still another method 
of interfering with their operation in such quarters. In 
order to use these agencies effectively we constructed air- 
craft stations in large numbers along the coast of France 
and the British Isles, assigned a certain stretch of coastline 
to each one of these stations, and kept the indicated area 

320 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 321 

constantly patrolled. The advantages which were pos- 
sessed by a fleet of aircraft operating at a considerable 
height above the water are at once apparent. The great 
speed of seaplanes in itself transformed them into formidable 
foes. The submarine on the surface could make a maximum 
of only 16 knots an hour, whereas an airplane made any- 
where from 60 to 100; it therefore had little difficulty, once 
it had sighted the under-water boat, in catching up with it 
and starting hostilities. Its great speed also made it pos- 
sible for an airplane or dirigible to patrol a much greater area 
of water than a surface or a subsurface vessel. An ob- 
server located several hundred feet in the heavens could see 
the submarine much more easily than could his comrades on 
other craft. If the water were clear he could at once detect 
it, even though it were submerged; in any event, merely 
lifting a man in the air greatly extended his horizon, and made 
it possible for him to pick up hostile vessels at a much greater 
distance. Moreover, the airplane had that same advantage 
upon which I have laid such emphasis in describing the anti- 
submarine powers of the submarine itself: that is, it was 
almost invisible to its under-water foe. If the U-boat were 
lying on the surface, a seaplane or a dirigible was readily 
seen; but if it were submerged entirely, or even sailing at 
periscope depth, the most conspicuous enemy in the heavens 
was invisible. After our submarines and our aircraft had 
settled down to their business of extermination, existence for 
those Germans who were operating in coastal waters becamiC 
extremely hazardous and nerve racking; their chief anxiety 
was no longer the depth bomb of a destroyer; they lived 
every moment in the face of hidden terrors ; they never knew 
when a torpedo would explode into their vitals, or when an 
unseen bomb, dropped from the heavens, would fall upon 
their fragile decks. 

I have said that the destructive achievements of aircraft 
figure only moderately in the statistics of the war; this was 
because the greater part of their most valuable work was 



322 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

done in cooperation with war vessels. Aircraft in the Navy 
performed a service not unlike that which it performed in 
the Army. We are all familiar with the picture of airplanes 
saiHng over the field of battle, obtaining information which 
was wirelessed back to their own forces, "spotting" artillery 
positions, and giving ranges. The seaplanes and dirigibles of 
the Allied navies performed a similar service on the ocean. 
To a considerable extent they became the "eyes" of the de- 
stroyers and other surface craft, just as the airplanes on the 
land became the "eyes" of the Army. As part of their 
equipment all the dirigibles had wireless telegraph and wire- 
less telephone; as soon as a submarine was ''spotted," the 
news was immediately flashed broadcast, and every offensive 
warship which was anywhere in the neigborhood, as well as 
the airplane itself, started for the indicated scene. There are 
several cases in which the sinking of submarines by destroyers 
was attributed to information wirelessed in this fashion by 
American aircraft; and since the air service of the British 
navy was many times greater than our own, there are many 
more such "indirect sinkings" credited to the British effort. 
The following citation, which I submitted to the Navy 
Department in recommending Lieutenant John J. Schieffelin 
for the Distinguished Service Medal, illustrates this co- 
operation between air and surface craft : 

This officer performed many hazardous reconnaissance flights, 
and on July gth, 1918, he attacked an enemy submarine with 
bombs and then directed the British destroyers to the spot, which 
were successful in seriously damaging the submarine. Again, on 
July 19th, 1918, Lieutenant Schieffelin dropped bombs on another 
enemy submarine, and then signalled trawlers to the spot, which 
delivered a determined attack against the submarine, which 
attack was considered highly successful and the submarine seri- 
ously damaged, if not destroyed. This officer was at all times an 
example of courageous loyalty. 

Besides scouting and "spotting" and bombing, the aerial 
hunters of the submarine developed great value in escorting 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 323 

convoys. A few dirigibles, located on the flanks of a convoy, 
protected them almost as effectively as the destroyers them- 
selves; and even a single airship not infrequently brought a 
group of merchantmen and troopships safely into port. 
Sometimes the airships operated in this way as auxiliaries to 
destroyers, while sometimes they operated alone. In ap- 
plying this mechanism of protection to merchant convoys, 
we were simply adopting the method which Great Britain had 
been using for three years in the narrow passages of the 
English Channel. Much has been said of the skill with 
which the British navy transported about 20,000,000 souls 
back and forth between England and France in four years; 
and in this great movement seaplanes, dirigibles, and other 
forms of aircraft played an important part. In the same 
way this scheme of protection was found valuable with the 
coastal convoys, particularly with the convoys which sailed 
from one French port to another, and from British ports to 
places in Ireland, Holland, or Scandinavia. I have de- 
scribed the dangers in which these ships were involved owing 
to the fact that the groups were obliged to break up after 
entering the Channel and the Irish Sea, and thus to proceed 
singly to their destinations. Aircraft improved this situa- 
tion to a considerable extent, for they could often go to sea, 
pick up the ships, and bring them safely home. The cir- 
cumstance that our seaplanes, perched high in the air, 
could see the submarines long before they had reached 
torpedoing distance, and could, if necessary, signal to a 
destroyer for assistance, made them exceedingly valuable for 
this kind of work. 

Early in 1918, at the request of the British Government, 
we took over a large seaplane base which had been 
established by the British at Killingholme, England, a little 
seacoast town at the mouth of the Humber River. Ac- 
cording to the original plan we intended to cooperate from 
this point with the British in a joint expedition against 
enemy naval bases, employing for this purpose especially 



324 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

constructed towing lighters, upon which seaplanes were to be 
towed by destroyers to within a short flying distance of their 
objectives. Although this project was never carried out, 
Killingholme, because of its geographical location, became a 
very important base for seaplanes used in escorting mer- 
cantile convoys to and from Scandinavian ports, patrolling 
mine-fields while on the lookout for enemy submarines and 
making those all-important reconnaissance flights over the 
North Sea which were intended to give advanced warning of 
any activity of the German high seas fleet. These flights 
lasted usually from six to eight hours; the record was made 
by Ensigns S. C. Kennedy and C. H. Weatherhead, U. S. N., 
who flew for nine hours continuously on convoy escort duty. 
For a routine patrol, this compares very favorably indeed 
with the flight of the now famous trans-Atlantic NC-4. 

I can no better describe the splendid work of these en- 
thusiastic and courageous young Americans than to quote a 
few extracts from a report which was submitted to me by 
Ensign K. B. Keyes, of a reconnaissance flight in which he 
took part, while attached temporarily to a British seaplane 
station under post-graduate instruction. The picture given 
by Ensign Keyes is typical of the flights which our boys 
were constantly making: 

On June 4, 191 8, we received orders to carry out a reconnais- 
sance and hostile aircraft patrol over the North Sea and along 
the coast of Holland. It was a perfect day for such work, for the 
visibility was extremely good, with a light wind of fifteen knots and 
clouds at the high altitude of about eight or ten thousand feet. 

Our three machines from Felixstowe rose from the water at 
twelve o'clock, circled into patrol formation, and proceeded north- 
east by north along the coast to Yarmouth. Here we were 
joined by two more planes, but not without some trouble and slight 
delay because of a broken petrol pipe which was subsequently 
repaired in the air. We again circled into formation, Capt. 
Leckie, D. S. O., of Yarmouth, taking his position as leader of the 
squadron. 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 325 

At one o'clock the squadron proceeded east, our machine, 
being in the first division, flew at 1 ,500 feet and at about half a mile 
in the rear of Capt. Leckie's machine, but keeping him on our star- 
board quarter. 

We sighted nothing at all until about half-past two, when the 
Haaks Light Vessel slowly rose on the horizon, but near this mark 
and considerably more to the south we discovered a large fleet of 
Dutch fishing smacks. This fleet consisted of more than a hundred 
smacks. 

Ten minutes later we sighted the Dutch coast, where we changed 
our course more to the northeast. We followed the sandy 
beaches of the Islands of Texel and Vlieland until we came to 
Terschelling. In following the coast of Vlieland we were close 
enough to distinguish houses on the inside of the island and even to 
make out breakers rolling up on the sandy beach. 

At Terschelling we proceeded west in accordance with our 
orders but soon had to turn back because of Capt. Leckie's machine 
which had fallen out of formation and come to the water. This 
machine landed at three fifteen and we continued to circle around 
it, finding that the trouble was with a badly broken petrol pipe, 
until about fifteen minutes later, when we sighted five German 
planes steering west, a direction which would soon bring them upon 
us. 

At this time Capt. Barker had the wheel, Lt. Galvayne was 
seated beside him, but if we met the opposing forces he was to 
kneel on the seat with eyes above the cowl, where he could see all 
the enemy planes and direct the pilot in which direction to proceed. 
I was in the front cockpit with one gun and four hundred rounds of 
arrimunition. In the stern cockpit the engineer and wireless 
ratings were to handle three guns. 

We at once took battle formation and went forward to meet the 
enemy, but here we were considerably surprised to find that when 
we were nearly within range they had turned and were running 
away from us. At once we gave chase, but soon found that they 
were much too fast for us. Our machine had broken out of the 
formation and, with nose down, had crept slightly ahead of Capt. 
Leckie and we, being the nearest machine to the enemy, 1 had the 
satisfaction of trying out my gun for a number of rounds. It was 
quite impossible to tell whether I had registered any shots or not. 



326 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Our purpose in chasing these planes was to keep them away 
from the machine on the water which, if we had not been there, 
would have been shot to pieces. Finding that it was useless to 
follow them, as they could easily keep out of our range, we turned 
back and very shortly we were again circling around our machine 
on the water. 

It was not long before the enemy again came very close to, so 
we gave chase the second time. This time instead of five machines 
as before there were only four and one small scout could be seen 
flying in the direction of Borkum. 

It was the fourth time that we went off in pursuit of the enemy 
that we suddenly discovered that a large number of hostile planes 
were proceeding toward us, not in the air with the other four planes 
but very close to the water. There were ten planes in this first 
group, but they were joined a few minutes later by five more. 

We swung into battle formation and steered for the middle of 
the group. When we were nearly within range four planes on the 
port side and five planes on the starboard side rose to our level of 
fifteen hundred feet. Two planes passed directly beneath us firing 
upward. Firing was incessant from the beginning and the air 
seemed blue with tracer smoke. I gave most of my time to the 
four planes on our port side because they were exactly on the same 
level with us and seemed to be within good range, that is about 
two hundred yards. When we had passed each other 1 looked 
around and noticed that Lt. Galvayne was in a stooping position, 
with head and one arm on his seat, the other arm hanging down as 
if reaching for something. 1 had seen him in this position earlier in 
the day so thought nothing of it. All this I had seen in the frac- 
tion of a second for I had to continue firing. A few minutes later I 
turned around again and found with a shock that Lt. Galvayne was 
in the same position. It was then that the first inkling of the 
truth dawned upon me. By bending lower 1 discovered that his 
head was lying in a pool of blood. 

From this time on I have no clear idea of just what our manoeu- 
vering was, but evidently we put up a running fight steering east, 
then circled until suddenly 1 found our machine bad been cut off 
from the formation and we were surrounded by seven enemy sea- 
planes. 

This time we were steering west or more to the southwest. 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 327 

We carried on a running fight for ten miles or so until we drove the 
seven planes off. During the last few minutes of the fight our 
engine had been popping altogether too frequently and soon the 
engineer came forward to tell us that the port engine petrol pipe had 
broken. 

By this time I had laid out Lt. Galvayne in the wireless cock- 
pit, cleaned up the second pilot's seat, and taken it myself. 

The engagement had lasted about half an hour, and the closest 
range was one hundred yards while the average range was two 
hundred. The boat with Ensign Eaton in it landed between the 
Islands of Texelt and Vlieland, while the other boat, which had not 
taken any part in the fight, was last seen two miles off Vlieland and 
still taxiing in toward the beach. 

We descended to the water at five forty-five, ten miles north- 
west of Vlieland. During the ten minutes we were on the water I 
loosened Lt. Galvayne's clothing, made his position somewhat 
easier, and felt for his heart which at that time I was quite sure was 
beating feebly. 

When we rose from the water and ascended to fifteen hundred 
feet, we sighted two planes which later proved to be the two 
Yarmouth boats. We picked them up, swung into formation, and 
laid our course for Yarmouth. 

At ten minutes to seven we sighted land and twenty minutes 
after we were resting on the water in front of Yarmouth slipway. 

We at once summoned medical aid but found that nothing 
could be done. The shot had gone through his head, striking the 
mouth and coming out behind his ear, tearing a gash of about two 
inches in diameter. 

The boat had been more or less riddled, a number of shots 
tearing up the top between the front cockpit and the beginning of 
the cowl. 

The total duration of the flight was seven hours and ten 
minutes. 

American naval aviation had a romantic beginning; in- 
deed, the development of our air service from almost nothing 
to a force which, in European waters, comprised 2,500 
officers and 22,000 men, is one of the great accomplishments 



328 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

of the war. It was very largely the outcome of civilian 
enterprise and civilian public spirit. In describing our 
sub-chasers I have already paid tribute to the splendid 
qualities of reserve officers; and our indebtedness to this 
type of citizen was equally great in the aviation service. I 
can pay no finer tribute to American youth than to say that 
the great aircraft force which was ultimately assembled in 
Europe had its beginnings in a small group of undergraduates 
at Yale University. In recommending Mr. Trubee Davison 
for a Distinguished Service Medal, the commander of our 
aviation forces wrote: "This officer was responsible for the 
organization of the first Yale aviation unit of twenty-nine 
aviators who were later enrolled in the Naval Reserve 
Flying Corps. . . . This group of aviators formed 
the nucleus of the first Naval Reserve Flying Corps, and, 
in fact, may be considered as the nucleus from which the 
United States Aviation Forces, Foreign Service, later grew." 
This group of college boys acted entirely on their own initia- 
tive. While the United States was still at peace, encouraged 
only by their own parents and a few friends, they took up the 
study of aviation. It was their conviction that the United 
States would certainly get into the war, and they selected 
this branch as the one in which they could render greatest 
service to their country. These young men worked all 
through the summer of 19 16 at Port Washington, Long 
Island, learning how to fly: at this time they were an 
entirely unofficial body, paying their own expenses. Ulti- 
mately the unit comprised about twenty men; they kept 
constantly at work, even after college opened in the fall of 
19 16, and when war broke out they were prepared — ^for they 
had actually learned to fly. When the submarine scares 
disturbed the Atlantic seaboard in the early months of the 
war these Yale undergraduates were sent by the department 
scouting over Long Island Sound and other places looking 
for the imaginary Germans. In February, 19 17, Secretary 
Daniels recognized their work by making Davison a member of 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 329 

the Committee on Aeronautics ; in March practically every 
member of the unit was enrolled in the aviation service; and 
their names appear among the first one hundred aviators 
enrolled in the Navy — a list that ultimately included several 
thousand. So proficient had these undergraduates becom.e 
that they were used as a nucleus to train our aircraft forces; 
they were impressed as instructors at Buffalo, Bayshore, 
Hampton Roads, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 
Key West and Moorhead City. They began to go abroad 
in the summer of 19 17, and they were employed as instruc- 
tors in schools in France and England. These young men 
not only rendered great material service, but they manifested 
an enthusiasm, an earnestness, and a tireless vigilance which 
exerted a wonderful influence in strengthening the morale of 
the whole aviation department. " 1 knew that whenever we 
had a member of that Yale unit," says Lieutenant-Com- 
mander Edwards, who was aide for aviation at the London 
headquarters in the latter part of the war, "everything was 
all right. Whenever the French and English asked 11s to 
send a couple of our crack men to reinforce a squadron, I 
would say, 'Let's get some of the Yale gang.' We never 
made a mistake when we did this." 

There were many men in the regular navy to whom the 
nation is likewise indebted. Captain T. T. Craven served 
with very marked distinction as aide for aviation on the 
staff of Admiral Wilson, and afterward, after the armistice 
was signed, as the senior member of the Board which had 
been appointed to settle all claims with the French Govern- 
ment. Lieutenant (now Commander) Kenneth Whiting 
was another officer who rendered great service in aviation. 
Commander Whiting arrived in St. Nazaire, France, on the 
5th of June, 19 1 7, in command of the first aeronautic de- 
tachment, which consisted of 7 officers and 122 men. 

Such were the modest beginnings of American aviation in 
France. In a short time Commander Whiting was assigned 
to the command of the large station which was taken over 



330 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

at Killingholme, England, and in October, 19 17, Captain 
Hutch I. Cone came from the United States to take charge 
of the great aviation programme which had now been 
planned. Captain Cone had for many years enjoyed the 
reputation of being one of the Navy's most efficient adminis- 
trators; while still a lieutenant-commander, he had held for 
a considerable time the rank of rear-admiral, as chief of the 
Bureau of Steam Engineering; and in 19 17 he was com- 
manding naval officer of the Panama Canal, a position which 
required organizing ability of the highest order. It was at 
my request that he was ordered abroad to organize our 
European air forces. Captain Cone now came to Paris and 
plunged into the work of organizing naval aviation with all 
his usual vigor. 

It subsequently became apparent, however, that London 
would be a better place for his work than Paris, and Captain 
Cone therefore took up his headquarters in Grosvenor Gar- 
dens. Under his administration naval aviation foreign 
service grew to the proportions I have indicated and in- 
cluded in France six seaplane stations, three dirigible sta- 
tions, two kite balloon stations, one school of aerial gun- 
nery, one assembly and repair base, and the United States 
Naval Northern Bombing Group. In the British Isles there 
were established four seaplane stations and one kite balloon 
station in Ireland; one seaplane station and one assembly 
and repair base in England; and in Italy we occupied, at 
the request of the Italian Government, two seaplane stations 
at Pescara and Porto Corsini on the Adriatic. From these 
stations we bombed to good effect Austrian naval bases 
in that area. To Lieutenant-Commander J. L. Callan, 
U.S.N.R.F., is due much of the credit for the cordial relations 
which existed between the Italians and ourselves, as well as 
for the efficient conduct of our aviation forces in Italy under 
his command. 

Probably the most completely equipped aviation centre 
which we constructed was that at Pauillac, France, under 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 331 

the command of Captain F. T. Evans, U. S. N.; here we 
built accommodations for 20,000 men; we had here what 
would have eventually been a great airplane factory; had 
the war continued six months longer, we would have been 
turning out planes in this place on a scale almost large enough 
to supply our needs. The farsighted judgment and the 
really extraordinary professional ability of civil engineers 
D. G. Copeland and A. W. K. Billings made such work 
possible but only, I might add, with the hearty cooperation 
of Lieutenant-Commander Benjamin Briscoe and his small 
band of loyal and devoted co-workers. Another great ad- 
venture was the establishment of our Northern Bombing 
Group, under the command of Captain David C. Hanrahan, 
U. S. N. ; here we had 1 12 planes, 305 officers, and more than 
2,000 enlisted personnel, who devoted all of their attention to 
bombing German submarine bases at Zeebrugge and Ostend. 
This enterprise was a joint one with the marines under the 
command of Major A. A. Cunningham, an experienced 
pilot and an able administrator, who performed all of his 
various duties not only to my entire satisfaction but in a 
manner which reflected the greatest credit to himself as 
well as to the Marine Corps of which he was a worthy repre- 
sentative. Due to the fact that the rapidity of our con- 
struction work had exceeded that with which airplanes were 
being built at home, we entered into an agreement with the 
Italian Government whereby we obtained a number of 
Caproni planes in exchange for raw materials. Several of 
these large bombing airplanes were successfully flown over 
the Alps to the fields of Flanders, under the direction of 
Lieutenant-Commander E. O. MacDonnell, who deserves 
the greatest credit for the energetic and resourceful manner 
in which he executed this difficult task. 

In September, 19 18, Captain Cone's duties took him to 
Ireland; the ship on which he sailed, the Leinster, was tor- 
pedoed in the Irish Sea; Captain Cone was picked up un- 
conscious in the water, and, when taken to the hospital, it 



332 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

was discovered that both his legs were broken. It was 
therefore necessary to appoint another oificer in his stead, 
and I selected Lieutenant W. A. Edwards, who had served 
with credit on the destroyer Gushing, and who, for some 
time, had been second in command to Captain Cone in the 
aviation section. It was almost unprecedented to put at 
the head of such an important branch a young lieutenant 
who had only been out of the naval academy for a few 
years; ordinarily the duties would have required a man of 
Admiral's rank. Lieutenant Edwards, however, was not 
only extremely capable, but he had the gift of getting along 
splendidly with our Allies, particularly the British, with 
whom our intercourse was necessarily extensive, and with 
whom he was very popular. He remained in charge of the 
department for the rest of the war, winning golden opinions 
from his superiors and his subordinates, and the Distin- 
guished Service Order from King George. 

The armistice was signed before our aviation work had 
got completely into running order. Yet its accomplish- 
ments were highly creditable; and had the war lasted a little 
longer they would have reached great proportions. Of the 
thirty-nine direct attacks made on submarines, ten were, 
in varying degrees, "successful." Perhaps the most amazing 
hit made by any seaplane in the war was that scored by 
Ensign Paul F. Ives; he dropped a bomb upon a submarine, 
striking it directly on its deck; the result was partly tragical, 
partly ludicrous, for the bomb proved to be a "dud" and did 
not explode! In commenting on this and another credit- 
able attack, the British Admiralty wrote as follows: 

I beg to enclose for your information reports of attacks made on 
two enemy submarines on the 25th March by Pilot, Ensign J. F. 
McNamara, U. S. N., and Pilot, Ensign P. F. Ives, U. S. N. 

The Admiralty are of opinion that the submarine attacked by 
Pilot Ensign McNamara was damaged and that the attack of 
Pilot Ensign Ives might also have been successful had not his 
bombs failed to explode, which was due to no fault of his own, 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 333 

I should add that Wing Commander, Portsmouth Group has 
expressed his appreciation of the valuable assistance rendered by 
the United States Pilots. 



At the cessation of hostilities we had a total of more than 
500 planes of various descriptions actually in commission, a 
large number of which were in actual operation over the 
North Sea, the Irish Sea, the Bay of Biscay, and the Adria- 
tic; our bombing planes were making frequent flights over 
enemy submarine bases and 2,500 oificers and 22,000 en- 
listed men were making raids, doing patrols, bombing 
submarines, bombing enemy bases, taking photographs, 
making reconnaissance over enemy waters, and engaging 
enemy aircraft. There can be no doubt but that this great 
force was a factor in persuading the enemy to acknowledge 
defeat when he did. 

A few simple comparisons will illustrate the gigantic task 
which confronted us and the difficult es which were success- 
fully overcome in the establishment of our naval aviation 
force on foreign service. If all the buildings constructed and 
used for barracks for officers and men were joined end to end, 
they would stretch for a distance of twelve miles. The total 
cubic contents of all structures erected and used could be 
represented by a box 245 ft. wide, 300 ft. long, and 1,500 ft. 
high. In such a box more than ten Woolworth buildings could 
be easily placed. Twenty-nine telephone exchanges were in- 
stalled, and in addition connections were made to existing 
long-distance lines in England and France, and approxi- 
mately 80c miles of long-distance lines were constructed in 
Ireland, so that every station could be communicated with 
from London headquarters. The lumber used for con- 
struction work would provide a board-walk one foot wide, 
extending from New York City to the Isle of Malta — a 
distance of more than 4,000 miles. 

When we consider the fact that during the war naval 
aviation abroad grew in personnel to be more than one-half 



334 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

the size of the entire pre-war American navy, it is not at all 
astonishing that all of those regular officers who had been 
trained in this service were employed almost exclusively in 
an administrative capacity, which naturally excluded them 
from taking part in the m.ore exciting work of bombing sub- 
marines and fighting aircraft. To their credit be it said that 
they chafed considerably under this enforced restraint, but 
they were so few in number that we had to employ them not 
in command of seaplanes, but of air stations where they 
rendered the most valuable service. 

For the reserves I entertain the very highest regard and 
even personal affection. Collectively they were magnificent 
and they reflected the greatest credit upon the country they 
served so gallantly and with such brilliant success. I know 
of no finer individual exploit in the war than that of Ensign 
C. H. Hammon who, while attached to our Air Station at 
Porto Corsini, took part in a bombing raid on Pola, in 
which he engaged two enemy airplanes and as a result had 
his plane hit in several places. During this engagement a 
colleague. Ensign G. H. Ludlow, was shot down. Ensign 
Hammon went to his rescue, landed his boat on the water 
just outside of Pola harbor, picked up the stricken aviator, 
and flew back to Porto Corsini, a distance of seventy-five 
miles. A heavy sea made it highly probable that his frail 
boat, already damaged by his combat with the enemy, would 
collapse and that he would be drowned or captured and 
made a prisoner of war. For this act of courageous devotion 
to duty I recommended Ensign Hammon for the Congres- 
sional Medal of Honor. 

The mention of this officer calls to my mind the exploits 
of Lieutenant-Commander A. L. Gates, who was the second 
of only three officers attached to the Naval Forces in Europe 
whom I recommended for the Congressional Medal of 
Honor. The citation in the case of Gates reads as follows 
and needs no elaboration to prove the calibre of the man: 
"This officer commanded the U. S. Naval Air Station, Dun- 



FIGHTING SUBMARINES 335 

kirk, France, with very marked efficiency and under almost 
constant shell and bomb fire from the enemy. Alone and 
unescorted he rescued the crew of a British airplane wrecked 
in the sea off Ostend for which he was awarded the Distin- 
guished Flying Cross by the British Government. This 
act of bravery was actually over and above the duties re- 
quired of this officer and in itself demonstrates the highest 
type of courage. Lieutenant Commander Gates took part 
in a number of flights over the enemy lines and was shot 
down in combat and taken prisoner by the enemy. He 
made several heroic and determined attempts to escape. 
During all of his service this officer was a magnificent ex- 
ample of courage, modesty, and energetic devotion to duty. 
He at all times upheld the very highest traditions of the 
Naval Service." 

Volumes could well be written about the work of these 
splendid young Americans — of how Ensign Stephen Potter 
shot down in flames an enemy seaplane from a position over 
Heligoland Bight; unfortunately he made the supreme sacri- 
fice only a month later when he in turn was shot down in 
flames and fell to his resting place in the North Sea; and of 
De Cernea and Wilcox and Ludlow. Theirs was the spirit 
which dominated the entire Force and which made it possible 
to accomplish what seemed at times to be almost the im- 
possible. It was the superior "will to victory" which 
proved to be invincible. 



CHAPTER XII 
THE NAVY FIGHTING ON THE LAND 

BESIDES transporting American troops, the Navy, in 
one detail of its work, actually participated in war- 
I fare on the Western Front. Though this feature of 
our eflFort has nothing to do with the main subject, 
the defeat of the submarine, yet any account of the Amer- 
ican navy in the war which overlooks the achievements of 
our naval batteries on land would certainly be incomplete. 
The use of naval guns in war operations was not unprece- 
dented; the British used such guns in the Boer War, 
particularly at Ladysmith and Spion Kop; and there were 
occasions in which such armament rendered excellent service 
in the Boxer Rebellion. All through the Great War, British, 
French, and Germans frequently reinforced their army 
artillery with naval batteries. But, compared with the 
American naval guns which under the command of Rear- 
Admiral Charles P. Plunkett performed such telling deeds 
against the retreating Germans in the final phases of the 
conflict, all previous equipment of naval guns on shore had 
been less efficient in one highly important respect. 

For the larger part of the war, the Germans had had a 
great gun stationed in Belgium bombarding Dunkirk. The 
original purpose in sending American naval batteries to 
France was to silence this gun. The proposal was made in 
November, 19 17; but, rapidly as the preparations progressed, 
the situation had entirely changed before our five 14-mch 
guns were ready to leave for France. In the spring of 19 18 
the Germans began the great drive which nearly took them 
to the Channel ports; and under the conditions which pre- 

336 



NAVY FIGHTING ON LAND 337 

vailed in that area it was impossible to send our guns to the 
Belgian coast. Meanwhile, the enemy had stationed a gun, 
having a range of nearly 75 miles, in the forest of Compiegne; 
the shells from this weapon, constantly falling upon Paris, were 
having a more demoralizing effect upon the French populace 
than was officially admitted. The demand for the silencing 
of this gun came from all sides; and it was a happy coin- 
cidence that, at just about the time when this new peril 
appeared, the American naval guns were nearly ready to be 
transported to France. Encouraged by the success of this 
long-range gun on Paris, the Germans were preparing 
long-range bombardments on several sections of the front. 
They had taken huge guns from the new battle-cruiser 
Hindenburg and mounted them at convenient points for 
bombarding Dunkirk, Chalons-Sur-Marne, and Nancy. In all, 
the Allied intelligence departments reported that sixteen rifles 
of great calibre had left Kiel in May, 19 18, and that they 
would soon be trained upon important objectives in France. 
For this reason it was welcome news to the Allies, who were 
deficient in this type of artillery, that five naval 14-inch 
guns, with mountings and ammunition and supply trains, 
were ready to embark for the European field. The Navy 
received an urgent request from General Pershing that 
these guns be landed at St. Nazaire; it was to be their main 
mission to destroy the " Big Bertha" which was raining shells 
on Paris, and to attack specific points, especially railroad 
communications and the bridges across the Rhine. 

The initiative in the design of these mobile railway bat- 
teries was taken by the Bureau of Ordnance of the Navy 
Department, under Rear-Admiral Ralph Earle, and the de- 
tails of the design were worked out by the officers of that 
bureau and Admiral Plunkett. The actual construction of 
the great gun mounts on the cars from which the guns were 
to be fired, and of the specially designed cars of the supply 
trains for each gun, was an engineering feat which reflects 
great credit upon the Baldwin Locomotive Works and 



338 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

particularly upon its president, Mr. Samuel M. Vauclain, 
who undertook the task with the greatest enthusiasm. The 
reason why our naval guns represented a greater achievement 
than anything of a similar nature accomplished by the 
Germans was that they were mobile. Careful observations 
taken of the bombardment of Dunkirk revealed the fact that 
the gun with which it was being done was steadily losing 
range. This indicated that the weapon was not a movable 
one, but that it was firmly implanted in a fixed position. 
The 'seventy-five mile gun which was bombarding Paris was 
similarly emplaced. The answering weapon which our 
ordnance department now proposed to build was to have the 
ability to travel from place to place — to go to any position 
to which the railroad system of France could take it. To do 
this it would be necessary to build a mounting on a railroad 
car and to supply cars which could carry the crews, their 
sleeping quarters, their food and ammunition; to construct, 
indeed, a whole train for each separate gun. This equip- 
ment must be built in the United States, shipped over three 
thousand miles of ocean, landed at a French port, assembled 
there, and started on French railroads to the several destina- 
tions at the front. The Baldwin Locomotive Works ac- 
cepted the contract for constructing these mountings and 
attendant cars; it began work February 13, 19 18; two 
months afterward the first mount had been finished and the 
gun was being proved at Sandy Hook, New Jersey; and by 
July all five guns had arrived at St. Nazaire and were being 
prepared to be sent forward to the scene of hostilities. The 
rapidity with which this work was completed furnished an 
illustration of American manufacturing genius at its best. 
Meanwhile, Admiral Plunkett had collected and trained his 
crews; it speaks well for the morale of the Navy that, when 
news of this great operation was first noised about, more than 
20,000 officers and men volunteered for the service. 

At first the French, great as was their admiration for these 
guns and the astonishingly accurate marksmanship which 



NAVY FIGHTING ON LAND 339 

they had displayed on their trials, believed that their railroad 
beds and their bridges could not sustain such a weight ; the 
French engineers, indeed, declined at the beginning to ap- 
prove our request for the use of their rails. The constant rain 
of German shells on Paris, however, modified this attitude; 
the situation was so urgent that such assistance as these 
American guns promised was welcome. One August morning, 
therefore, the first train started for Helles Mouchy, the 
point from which it was expected to silence the " Big Bertha." 
The progress of this train through France was a triumphant 
march. Our own confidence in the French road bed and 
bridges was not much greater than that of the French them- 
selves; the train therefore went along slowly, climbed the 
grades at a snail's pace, and took the curves with the utmost 
caution. As they crossed certain of the bridges, the crews 
held their breath and sat tight, expecting almost every 
moment to crash through. All along the route the French 
populace greeted the great battery train with one long cheer, 
and at the towns and villages the girls decorated the long 
muzzle of the gun with flowers. But there were other spec- 
tators than the French. Expertly as this unusual train had 
been camouflaged, the German airplane observers had de- 
tected its approach. As it neared the objective the shells 
that had been falling on Paris ceased; before the Americans 
could get to work, the Germans had removed their mighty 
weapon, leaving nothing but an emplacement as a target for 
our shells. Though our men were therefore deprived of the 
privilege of destroying this famous long-range rifle, it is 
apparent that their arrival saved Paris from further bom- 
bardment, for nothing was heard of the gun for the rest of the 
war. 

The guns proved exceedingly effective in attacking Ger- 
man railroad centres, bridges, and other essential positions; 
and as they could be fired from any point of the railroad 
tracks behind the Western Front, and as they could be 
shifted from one position to another, with all their personnel 



340 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

and equipment, as fast as the locomotives could haul them, 
it was apparent that the more guns of this design that could 
be supplied the better. These qualities were at once recog- 
nized by the Army which called upon the Navy for assistance 
in building a large number of railway batteries; and if the 
war had continued these great guns would soon have been 
thundering all along the Western Front. 

From the time the naval guns were mounted until the 
armistice Admiral Plunkett's men were busy on several 
points of the Allied lines. In this time the five naval guns 
fired 782 shells at distances ranging from 18 to 23 miles- 
They played great havoc in the railroad yards at Laon, 
destroying large stretches of track that were indispensable 
to the Germans, and in general makmg this place practically 
useless as a railroad centre. Probably the greatest service 
which they rendered the cause of the Allies was in the region 
north of Verdun. In late October three naval batteries 
were brought up to Chamy and Thierville and began bom- 
barding the railroad which ran through Montmedy, Longu- 
yon, and Conflans. This was the most important line of 
communication on the Western Front ; it was the road over 
which the German army in the east was supplied, and there 
was practically no other line by which the great German 
armies engaging the Americans could escape. From October 
23d to the hour when the armistice was signed our 14-inch 
guns were raining shells upon this road. So successful was 
this bombardment that the German traffic was stopped, not 
only while the firing was taking place, but for several hours 
each day after it had ceased. What this meant to the 
success of the Allied armies the world now knows. The 
result is perfectly summed up in General Pershing's report: 

"Our large calibre guns," he says, "had advanced and 
were skilfully brought into position to fire upon the important 
lines at Montmedy, Longuyon, and Conflans; the strategical 
goal which was our highest hope was gained. We had cut 
the enemy's main line of communications and nothing but 



NAVY FIGHTING ON LAND 341 

surrender or an armistice could save his army from complete 
disaster." 

These guns were, of course, only one of many contributing 
factors, but that the Navy had its part in this great achieve- 
ment is another example of the success with which our two 
services cooperated with each other throughout the war — 
a cooperation which, for eificient and harmonious devotion 
to a common cause has seldom, if ever, been equalled. 



CHAPTER XIII 

TRANSPORTING TWO MILLION AMERI- 
CAN SOLDIERS TO FRANCE 

I 

IN MARCH, 1918, it became apparent that the German 
submarine campaign had failed. The prospect that con- 
fronted the Allied forces at that time, when compared 
with the conditions which had faced them in April, 
19 1 7, forms one of the most impressive contrasts in history. 
In the first part of the earher year the cause of the Allied 
Powers, and consequently the cause of liberty throughout the 
world, had reached the point almost of desperation. On 
both land and sea the Germans seemed to hold the future in 
their hands. In Europe the armies of the Central Powers 
were everywhere in the ascendant. The French and British 
were holding their own in France, and in the Somme cam- 
paign they had apparently inflicted great damage upon the 
German forces, yet the disintegration of the Russian army, 
the unmistakable signs of which had already appeared, was 
bringing nearer the day when they would have to meet the 
undivided strength of their enemy. At the time in question^ 
Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro were conquered countries, 
and Italy seemed unable to make any progress against the 
Austrians. Bulgaria and Turkey had become practically 
German provinces, and the dream of a great Germanic 
western empire was rapidly approaching realization. So 
strong was Germany in a military sense, so little did she ap- 
prehend that the United States could ever assemble her 
resources and her men in time to make them a decisive ele- 
ment in the struggle, that the German war lords, in their 

342 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 343 

effort to bring the European conflict to a quick conclusion, 
did not hesitate to take the step which was destined to make 
our country their enemy. Probably no nation ever adopted a 
war measure with more confidence in its success. The results 
which the German submarines could accomplish seemed at 
that time to be simply a matter of mathematical calculation. 
The Germans estimated that they could sink at least i ,000,000 
tons a month, completely cut off Great Britain's supplies of 
food and war materials, and thus end the war by October or 
November of 19 18. Even though the United States should 
declare war, what could an unprepared nation like our own 
accomplish in such a brief period? Millions of troops we 
might indeed raise, but we could not train them in three or 
four months, and, even though we could perform such a 
miracle, it was ridiculous to suppose that we could transport 
them to Europe through the submarine danger zone. I 
have already shown that the Germans were not alone in thus 
predicting the course of events. In the month of April, 191 7, 
I had found the Allied officials just about as distressed as 
the Germans were jubilant. Already the latter, in sinking 
merchant ships, had had successes which almost equalled 
their own predictions ; no adequate means of defence against 
the submarine had been devised; and the chiefs of the British 
navy made no attempts to disguise their apprehension for the 
future. 

Such was the atmosphere of gloom which prevailed in 
Allied councils in April, 19 17; yet one year later the naval 
situation had completely changed. The reasons for that 
change have been set forth in the preceding pages. In that 
brief twelve months the relative position of the submarine 
had undergone a marked transformation. Instead of being 
usually the pursuer it was now often the pursued. Instead 
of sailing jauntily upon the high seas, sinking helpless 
merchantmen almost at will, it was half-heartedly lying in 
wait along the coasts, seeking its victims in the vessels of 
dispersed convoys. If it attempted to push out to sea, and 



344 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

attack a convoy, escorting destroyers were likely to deliver 
one of their dangerous attacks; if it sought the shallower 
coastal waters, a fleet of yachts, sloops, and subchasers, were 
constantly ready to assail it with dozerxS of depth charges. An 
attempt to pass through the Straits of Dover meant almost 
inevitable destruction by mines; an attempt to escape into 
the ocean by the northern passage involved the momentary 
dread of a similar end or the hazard of navigating the 
difficult Pentland Firth. In most of the narrow passages 
Allied submarines lay constantly in wait with their tor- 
pedoes; a great fleet of airplanes and dirigibles was always 
circling above ready to rain a shower of bombs upon the 
under-water foe. Already the ocean floor about the British 
Isles held not far from 200 sunken submarines, with most of 
their crews, amounting to at least 4,000 men, whose deaths 
involved perhaps the most hideous tragedies of the war. 
Bad as was this situation, it was nothing compared with what 
it would become a few months or a year later. American 
and British shipyards were turning out anti-submarine craft 
with great rapidity; the industries of America, with their 
enormous output of steel, had been enlisted in the anti- 
submarine campaign. The American and British ship- 
building facilities were neutralizing the German campaign in 
two ways: they were not only constructing war vessels on a 
scale which would soon drive all the German submarines 
from the sea, but they were building merchant tonnage so 
rapidly that, in March, 19 18, more new tonnage was launched 
than was being destroyed. Thus by this time the Teutonic 
hopes of ending the war by the submarine had utterly col- 
lapsed; if the Germans were to win the war at all, or even to 
obtain a peace which would not be disastrous, some other 
programme must be adopted and adopted quickly. 

Disheartened by their failure at sea, the enemy therefore 
turned their eyes once more toward the land. The destruc- 
tion of Russian military power had given the German armies 
a great numerical superiority over those of the Allies. Theje 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 345 

seemed little likelihood that the French or the British, after 
three years of frightfully gruelling war, could add materially 
to their forces. Thus, with the grouping of the Powers, such 
as existed in 19 17, the Germans had a tremendous advantage 
on their side, for Russia, which German statesmen for fifty 
years had feared as a source of inexhaustible man-supply to 
her enemies, had disappeared as a military power. But a 
new element in the situation now counter-balanced this 
temporary gain ; that was the daily increasing importance of 
the United States in the war. The Germans, who in 19 17 
had despised us as an enemy, immediate or prospective, now 
despised us no longer. The army which they declared could 
never be raised and trained was actually being raised and 
trained by the millions. The nation which their publicists 
had denounced as lacking cohesion and public spirit had 
adopted conscription simultaneously with their declaration 
of war, and the people whom the Germans had affected to 
regard as devoted only to the pursuit of gain and pleasure had 
manifested a unity of purpose which they had never before 
displayed, and had offered their lives, their labors, and their 
wealth without limit to the cause of the Allies. Up to 
March, 19 18, only a comparatively small part of this Ameri- 
can army had reached Europe, but the Germans had already 
tested its fighting quality and had learned to respect it. Yet 
all these manifestations would not have disturbed the Ger- 
manic calculations except for one depressing fact. Even a 
nation of 100,000,000 brave and energetic people, fully 
trained and equipped for war, is not a formidable foe so long 
as an impassable watery gulf of three thousand miles sepa- 
rates them from the field of battle. 

For the greater part of 19 17 the German people believed 
that their submarines could bar the progress of the American 
armies. By March, 19 18, they had awakened from this 
delusion. Not only was an American army millions strong 
in process of formation, but the alarming truth now 
dawned upon the Germans that it could b^ transported to 



346 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Europe. The great industries of America could provide 
munitions and food to supply any number of soldiers inde- 
finitely, and these, too, could be brought to the Western 
Front. Outwardly, the German chiefs might still affect to 
despise this new foe, but in their hearts they knew that it 
spelled their doom. They were not now dealing with a 
corrupt Czardom and hordes of ignorant and passionless 
Slavs, who could be eliminated by propaganda and sedition; 
they were dealing with millions of intelligent and energetic 
freemen, all animated by a mighty and almost religious 
purpose. Yet the situation, desperate as it seemed, held 
forth one more hope. If the German armies, which still 
greatly outnumbered the French and British, could strike 
and win a decisive victory before the Americans could arrive, 
then they might still force a satisfactory peace. "It is a 
race between Ludendorff and Wilson" is the terse and ac- 
curate way in which Lloyd George summed up the situation. 
The great blow fell on March 21, 1918; the Bdiish and the 
French met it with heroism, but it was quite evident that 
they were fighting against terrible odds. At this time the 
American army in France numbered about 300,000 men; it 
now became the business of the American navy^ assisted by 
the British, to transport the American troops who could in- 
crease these forces sufficiently to turn the balance in the 
Allies' favor.' 

The supreme hour, to which all the anti-submarine labors 
of the preceding year were merely preliminary, had now 
arrived. Since the close of the war there has been much 
discussion of the part which the American navy played in 
bringing it to a successful end. Even during the war there 
was some criticism on this point. There were two more or 
less definite opinions in the public mind upon this question. 
One was that the main business of our war vessels was to 
convoy the American soldiers to France; the other empha- 
sized the anti-submarine warfare as its most important duty. 
Any one would suppose, from the detached way in which 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 347 

these two subjects have been discussed, that the anti-sub- 
marine warfare and the successful transportation of troops 
were separate matters. An impression apparently prevails 
that, at the beginning of the war, the American navy could 
have quietly decided whether it would devote its energies to 
making warfare on the submarine or to convoying American 
armies; yet the absurdity of such a conception must be ap- 
parent to any one who has read the foregoing pages. The 
several operations in which the Allied navies engaged were 
all part of a comprehensive programme ; they were all inter- 
dependent. According to my idea, the business of the 
American navy was to join its forces whole-heartedly with 
those of the Allies in the effort to win the war. Anything 
which helped to accomplish this great purpose became auto- 
matically our duty. Germany was basing her chances of 
success upon the submarine; our business was therefore 
to assist in defeating the submarine. The cause of the Allies 
was our cause; our cause was the cause of the Allies; 
anything which benefited the Allies benefited the United 
States; and anything which benefited the United States 
benefited the Allies. Neither we nor France nor England 
were conducting a separate campaign; we were separate 
units of a harmonious whole. At the beginning the one 
pressing duty was to put an end to the sinking of merchant- 
men, not because these merchantmen were for the larger 
part British, but because the failure to do so would have 
meant the elimination of Great Britain from the war, with 
results which would have meant defeat for the other Allies. 
Let us imagine, for a moment, what the sequence of events 
would have been had the submarine campaign against mer- 
chant shipping succeeded; in that case Britain and France 
would have been compelled to surrender unconditionally 
and the United States would therefore have been forced to 
fight the Central Empires alone. Germany's terms of peace 
would have included the surrender of all the Allied fleets; 
this would eventually have left the United States navy to 



348 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

fight the German navy reinforced by the ships of Great 
Britain, Austria, France, and Italy. In such a contest we 
should have been outnumbered about three or four to one. 
I have such confidence in the power and purpose of America 
as to believe that, even in a single-handed conflict with 
Germany, we should have won in the end; but it is evident 
that the problem would have been quite a different one from 
that of fighting in cooperation with the Allies against the 
Germanic foe. 

Simply as a matter of self-interest and strategy it was 
certainly wisdom to throw the last ounce of our strength into 
the scale of the Allied navies; and it was therefore inevitable 
that we should first of all use our anti-submarine craft to 
protect all shipping sailing to Europe and to clear the sea of 
submarines. In doing this we were protecting the food 
supply not only of Great Britain, but of France and our 
other Allies, for most of the materials which we sent to our 
European friends were transported first to England and 
thence were shipped across the Channel. Moreover, our 
twelve months' campaign against the submarine was an in- 
valuable preliminary to transporting the troops. Does any 
sane person believe that we could have put two million Ameri- 
cans into France had the German submarines maintained 
until the spring and summer of 19 18 the striking power which 
had been theirs in the spring of 19 17? Merely to state the 
question is to answer it. In that same twelve months we had 
gained much experience which was exceedingly valuable when 
we began transporting troops in great numbers. The most 
efficacious protection to merchant shipping, the convoy, 
was similarly the greatest safeguard to our military trans- 
ports. Those methods which had been so successfully used 
in shipping food, munitions, and materials were now used in 
shipping soldiers. The section of the great headquarters 
which we had developed in London for routing convoys was 
used for routing transports, and the American naval officer, 
Captain Byron A, Long, who had demonstrated such great 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 349 

ability in this respect, was likewise the master mind in direct- 
ing the course of the American soldiers to France. 

In other ways we had laid the foundations for this, the 
greatest troop movement in history. In the preceding 
twelve months we had increased the oil tankage at Brest 
more than four fold, sent over repair ships, and augmented 
its repair facilities. This port and all of our naval activities 
in France were under the command first of Rear-Admiral 
Wm. B. Fletcher, and later Rear-Admiral Henry B. Wilson. 
It was a matter of regret that we could not earlier have made 
Brest the main naval base for the American naval forces in 
France, for it was in some respects strategically better located 
for that purpose than was any other port in Europe. Even 
for escorting certain merchant convoys into the Channel Brest 
would have provided a better base than either Plymouth 
or Queenstown. A glance at the map explains why. To 
send destroyers from Queenstown to pick up convoys and 
escort them into the Channel or to French ports and thence 
return to their base involved a long, triangular trip ; to send 
such destroyers from Brest to escort these involved a smaller 
amount of steaming and a direct east and west voyage. 
Similarly, Queenstown was a much better location for de- 
stroyers sent to meet convoys bound for ports in the Irish 
Sea over the northern "trunk line." But unfortunately it 
was utterly impossible to use the great natural advantages 
of Brest in the early days of war; the mere fact that this 
French harbor possessed most inadequate tankage facilities 
put it out of the question, and it was also very deficient in 
docks, repair facilities, and other indispensable features of a 
naval base. At this time Brest was hardly more than able 
to provide for the requirements of the French, and it would 
have embarrassed our French allies greatly had we attempted 
to establish a large American force there, before we had 
supplied the essential oil fuel and repair facilities. The ships 
which we did send in the first part of the war were mostly 
yachts, of the "dollar-a-year" variety, which their owners 



350 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

had generously given to the national service; their crews 
were largely of that type of young business man and college 
undergraduate to whose skill and devotion I have already 
paid tribute. This little flotilla acquitted itself splendidly 
up and down the coast of France. Meanwhile, we were con- 
structing fuel oil tanks; and as soon as these were ready 
and repair ships were available, we began building up a large 
force at Brest — a force which was ultimately larger than the 
one we maintained at Queenstown; at the height of the troop 
movements it comprised about 36 destroyers, 12 yachts, 3 
tenders, and several mine-sweepers and tugs. The fine work 
which this detachment accomplished in escorting troop and 
supply convoys is sufficient evidence of the skill acquired by 
the destroyers and other vessels in carrying out their duties 
in this peculiar warfare. 

Meanwhile, on the other side of the Atlantic, a great 
organization had been created under the able direction of 
Rear-Admiral Albert Cleaves for maintaining and adminis- 
tering the fleet of transports and their ocean escorts. Also, as 
soon aswarwas declared the work was begun of converting into 
transports those Cerman merchant ships which had been in- 
terned in American ports. The successful completion of this 
work was, in itself, a great triumph for the American navy. Of 
the vesselswhich the Cermans had left in our hands, seventeen 
at New York, Boston, Norfolk, and Philadelphia, seemed to 
be adapted for transport purposes, but the Cermans had not 
intended that we should make any such use of them. The 
condition of these ships, after their Cerman custodians had 
left, was something indescribable; they reflected great dis- 
credit upon Cerman seamanship, for it would have been 
impossible for any people which really loved ships to permit 
them to deteriorate as had these vessels and to become such 
cesspools of filth. For three years the Cermans had evidently 
made no attempt to clean them; the sanitary conditions 
were so bad that our workmen could not sleep on board, but 
had to have sleeping quarters near the docks; they spent 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 351 

weeks scrubbing, scraping, and disinfecting, in a finally suc- 
cessful effort to make the ships suitable habitations for 
human beings. Not only had the Germans permitted such 
liners as the Vaterland and the Kronprin:(essin Cecilie to go 
neglected, but, on their departure, they had attempted to 
injure them in all conceivable ways. The cylinders had been 
broken, engines had been smashed, vital parts of the ma- 
chinery had been removed and thrown into the sea, ground 
glass had been placed in the oil cups, gunpowder had been 
placed in the coal — evidently in the hope of causing explo- 
sions when the vessels were at sea — and other damage of a 
more subtle nature had been done, it evidently being the 
expectation that the ships would break down when on the 
ocean and beyond the possibility of repair. Although our 
navy yards had no copies of the plans of these vessels or their 
machinery — the Germans having destroyed them all — and 
although the missing parts were of peculiarly German design, 
they succeeded, in an incredibly short time, in making them 
even better and speedier vessels than they had ever been 
before. 

The national sense of humor did not fail the transport 
service when it came to rechristening these ships; the 
Princess Irene became the Pocahontas, the Rhein the Sus- 
quehanna; and there was also an ironic justice in the fact that 
the Vaterland, which had been built by the Germans partly 
for the purpose of transporting troops in war, actually ful- 
filled this mission, though not quite in the way which the 
Germans had anticipated. Meanwhile, both the American 
and the British mercantile marines were supplementing this 
German tonnage. The first troops which we sent to France, 
in June, 19 17, were transported in ships of the United Fruit 
Company; and when the German blow was struck, in March, 
1918, both the United States and Great Britain began collect- 
ing from all parts of the world vessels which could be used as 
troop transports. We called in all available vessels from the 
Atlantic and Pacific coasts and the Great Lakes; England 



352 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

stripped her trade routes to South America, Australia, 
and the East, and France and Italy also made their con- 
tributions. Of all the American troops sent to France 
from the beginning of the war, the United States provided 
transports for 46.25 per cent., Great Britain for 51.25, 
the remainder being provided by France and Italy. Of 
those sent between March, 19 18, and the armistice, 
American vessels carried 42.15 per cent., British 55.40 
per cent.* 

Yet there was one element in the safe transportation of 
troops which was even more fundamental than those which I 
have named. The basis of all our naval operations were the 
dreadnaughts and the battle-cruisers of the Grand Fleet. It 
was this aggregation, as I have already indicated, which 
made possible the operation of all the surface ships that 
destroyed the effectiveness of the submarines. Had the 
Grand Fleet suddenly disappeared beneath the waves, all 
these offensive craft would have been driven from the seas, 
the Allies' sea lines of communication would have been cut, 
and the war would have ended in Germany's favor. From 
the time the transportation of troops began the United 
States had a squadron of five dreadnaught battleships 
constantly with the Grand Fleet. The following vessels 
performed this important duty: the 'New York, Captain 
C. F. Hughes, afterward Captain E. L. Beach; the Wyoming, 
Captain H. A. Wiley, afterward Captain H. H. Christy; the 
Florida, Captain Thomas Washington, afterward Captain 
M. M. Taylor; the Delaware, Captain A. H. Scales; the 
Arkansas, Captain W. H. G. Bullard, afterward Captain 
L. R. de Steiguer; and the Texas, Captain Victor Blue. 
These vessels gave this great force an unquestioned pre- 
ponderance, and made it practically certain that Germany 
would not attempt another general sea battle. Under Rear- 
Admiral Hugh Rodman, the American squadron performed 

* These figures are taken from the Annual Report of the Secretary of the Navy 
for 1 919, page 207. 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 353 

excellent service and made the most favorable impression 
upon the chiefs of the Allied navies. Under the general 
policy of cooperation established throughout our European 
naval forces these vessels were quickly made a part of the 
Grand Fleet in so far as concerned their military operations. 
This was, of course, wholly essential to efficiency — a point 
the layman does not always understand — so essential, in 
fact, that it may be said that, if the Grand Fleet had gone 
into battle the day after our vessels joined, the latter might 
have decreased rather than increased the fighting efficiency 
of the whole; for, though our people and the British spoke 
the same language, the languages of the ships, that is, their 
methods of communication by signals were wholly different. 
It was therefore our duty to stow our signal flags and 
books down below, and learn the British signal language. 
This they did so well that four days after their arrival they 
went out and manoeuvred successfully with the Grand Fleet. 
In the same way they adopted the British systems of tactics 
and fire control, and in every other way conformed to the 
established practices of the British. Too great praise cannot 
be given the officers and men of our squadron, not only for 
their efficiency and the cordiality of their cooperation, but 
for the patience with which they bore the almost continuous 
restriction to their ships, and the long vigil without the 
opportunity of a contact with the enemy forces. Just how 
well our ships succeeded in this essential cooperation was 
expressed by Admiral Sir David Beatty in the farewell 
speech which he made to them upon the day of their depar- 
ture for home. He said in part : 

"I want, first of all, to thank you. Admiral Rodman, 
the captains, officers, and ships' companies of the magnificent 
squadron, for the wonderful cooperation and the loyalty 
you have given to me and to my admirals; and the assistance 
that you have given us in every duty you had to under- 
take. The support which you have shown is that of true 



354 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

comradeship; and in time of stress, that is worth a very great 
deal. 

"You will return to your own shores; and I hope in the 
sunshine, which Admiral Rodman tells me always shines 
there, you won't forget your 'comrades of the mist' and your 
pleasant associations of the North Sea. . . . 

"I thank you again and again for the great part the 
Sixth Battle Squadron played in bringing about the greatest 
naval victory in history. I hope you will give this message 
to your comrades : 'Come back soon. Good-bye and good 
luck!'" 

But these were not the only large battleships which the 
United States had sent to European waters. Despite all the 
precautions which I have described, there was still one dan- 
ger which constantly confronted American troop transports. 
By June and July, 191 8, our troops were crossing the Atlan- 
tic in enormous numbers, about 300,000 a month, and were 
accomplishing most decisive results upon the battlefield. 
A successful attack upon a convoy, involving the sinking of 
one or more transports, would have had no important effect 
upon the war, but it would probably have improved Ger- 
man morale and possibly have injured that of the Americans. 
There was practically only one way in which such an attack 
could be made; one or more German battle-cruisers might 
slip out to sea and assail one of our troop convoys. In order 
to prepare for such a possibility, the department sent 
three of our most powerful dreadnaughts to Berehaven, 
Ireland — the Nevada, Captain A. T. Long, afterward Captain 
W. C. Cole; the Oklahoma, Captain M. L. Bristol, afterward 
Captain C. B. McVay; and the Utah, Captain F. B. Bassett, 
the whole division under the command of Rear-Admiral 
Thomas S. Rodgers. This port is located in Bantry Bay, on 
the extreme southwestern coast. For several months our 
dreadnaughts lay here, momentarily awaiting the news that 
a German raider had escaped, ready to start to sea and give 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 355 

battle. But the expected did not happen. The fact that 
this powerful squadron was ready for the emergency is per- 
haps the reason why the Germans never attempted the 
adventure. 

II 

A REFERENCE to the map which accompanies this 
chapter will help the reader to understand why our 
transports were able to carry American troops to France so 
successfully that not a single ingoing ship was ever struck 
by a torpedo. This diagram makes it evident that there 
were two areas of the Atlantic through which American 
shipping could reach its European destination. The line of 
division was about the forty-ninth parallel of latitude, the 
French city of Brest representing its most familiar landmark. 
From this point extending southward, as far as the forty- 
fifth parallel, which corresponds to the location of the city of 
Bordeaux, is a great stretch of ocean, about 200 miles wide. 
It includes the larger part of the Bay of Biscay, which forms 
that huge indentation with which our school geographies 
have made us Americans so familiar, and which has always 
enjoyed a particular fame for its storms, the dangers of its 
coast, and the sturdy and independent character of the 
people on its shores. The other distinct area to which the 
map calls attention extends northerly from the forty-ninth 
parallel to the fifty-second ; it comprises the English Channel, 
and includes both the French channel ports, the British ports, 
the southern coast of Ireland, and the entrance to the Irish 
Sea. The width of this second section is very nearly the 
same as that of the one to the south, or about 200 miles. 

Up to the present moment this narrative has been con- 
cerned chiefly with the northernmost of these two great sea 
pathways. Through this one to the north passed practically 
all the merchant shipping which was destined for the Allies. 
Consequently, as I have described, it was the great hunting 
ground of the German submarines. I have thus far had 



356 



THE VICTORY AT SEA 



little to say of the Bay of Biscay section because, until 19 18, 
there was comparatively little activity in that part of the 
ocean. For every ship which sailed through this bay I 
suppose that there were at least 100 which came through the 
Irish Sea and the English Channel. In my first report to the 
Department I described the principal scene of submarine 
activity as the area of the Atlantic reaching from the French 
island of Ushant — which lies just westward of Brest — to the 
tip of Scotland, and that remained the chief scene of hostili- 



etf- 




46» 



tHiMtBiwniiicea.i 






THE OPTION OFFERED TO THE GERMAN SUBMARINES 
This diagram explains why the American navy succeeded in transporting more 
than 2,000,000 American soldiers to France without loss because of submarines. 
The Atlantic was divided into two broad areas — shown by the shaded parts of the 
diagram. Through the northern area were sent practically all the merchant ships 
with supplies of food and materials for Europe. The southern area, extending 
roughly from the forty-fifth to the forty-ninth parallel, was used almost exclus- 
ively for troopships. The Germans could keep only eight or ten U-boats at the 
same time in the eastern Atlantic; they thus were forced to choose whether they 
should devote these boats to attacking mercantile or troop convoys. The text 
explains why, under these circumstances, they were compelled to use nearly all their 
forces against merchant ships and leave troop transports practically alone. 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 357 

ties to the end. Along much of the coastline south of Brest 
the waters were so shallow that the submarines could operate 
only with difficulty; it was a long distance from the German 
bases; the shipping consisted largely of coastal convoys; 
much of this was the coal trade from England; it is therefore 
not surprising that the Germans contented themselves with 
now and then planting mines off the most important harbors. 
Since our enemy was able to maintain only eight or ten U- 
boats in the Atlantic at one time it would have been sheer 
waste of energy to have stationed them off the western 
coast of France. They would have put in their time to little 
purpose and meanwhile the ships and cargoes which they 
were above all ambitious to destroy would have been safely 
finding their way into British ports. 

The fact that we had these two separate areas and that 
these areas were so different in character was what made it 
possible to send our 2,000,000 soldiers to France without 
losing a single man. From March, 1918, to the conclusion of 
the war, the American and British navies were engaged in 
two distinct transportation operations. The shipment of 
food and munitions continued in 1 918 as in 19 17, and on an 
even larger scale. With the passing of time the mechanism 
of these mercantile convoys increased in efficiency, and by 
March, 19 18, the management of this great transportation 
system had become almost automatic. Shipping from 
America came into British ports, it will be remembered, in 
two great "trunk lines," one of which ran through the English 
Channel and the other up the Irish Sea. But when the 
time came to bring over the American troops, we naturally 
selected the area to the south, both because it was necessary 
to send the troops to France and because we had here a great 
expanse of ocean which was relatively free of submarines. 
Our earliest troop shipments disembarked at St. Nazaire; 
later, when the great trans-Atlantic liners, both German and 
British, were pressed into service, we landed many tens of 
thousands at Brest; and all the largest French ports from 



358 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

Brest to Bordeaux took a share. A smaller number we sent 
to England, from which country they were transported 
across the Channel into France; when the demands became 
pressing, indeed, hardly a ship of any kind was sent to 
Europe without its quota of American soldiers; but, on the 
whole, the business of transportation in 19 18 followed simple 
and well-defined lines. We sent mercantile convoys in 
what I may call the northern "lane" and troop convoys in 
the southern "lane." We kept both lines of traffic for the 
most part distinct ; and this simple procedure offered to our 
German enemies a pretty problem. 

For, I must repeat, the German navy could maintain in 
the open Atlantic an average of only about eight or ten of her 
efficient U-boats at one time. The German Admiralty thus 
had to answer this difficult question: Shall we use these 
submarines to attack mercantile convoys or to attack troop 
convoys? The submarine flotilla which was actively en- 
gaged was so small that it was absurd to think of sending 
half into each lane; the Germans must send most of their 
submarines against cargo ships or most of them against 
troopships. Which should it be ? If it were decided to 
concentrate on mercantile vessels then the American armies, 
which the German chiefs had declared to their people could 
never get to the Western Front, would reach France and 
furnish General Foch the reserves with which he might crush 
the German armies before winter. If, on the other hand, the 
Germans should d-ecide to concentrate on troopships, then 
the food and supplies which were essential to the Allied cause 
would flow at an even greater rate into Great Britain and 
thence to the European nations. Whether it were more im- 
portant, in a military sense, to cut the Allies' commercial 
lines of communication or to sink troop transports is an in- 
teresting question. It is almost impossible for the Anglo- 
Saxon mind to consider this as a purely military matter, 
apart from the human factors involved. The sinking of a 
great transport, with 4,000 or 5,000 American boys on board. 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 359 

would have been a dreadful calamity and would have struck 
horror to the American people; it was something which the 
Navy was determined to prevent, and which we did prevent. 
Considered as a strictly military question, however — and that 
was the only consideration which influenced the Germans — 
it is hard to see how the loss of one transport, or even the loss 
of several, would have materially affected the course of the 
war. In judging the purely military results of such a 
tragedy, we must remember that the Allied armies were 
losing from 3,000 to 5,000 men a day; thus the sinking of an 
American transport once a week would not have particularly 
affected the course of the war. The destruction of merchant 
shipping in large quantities, however, represented the one 
way in which the Germans could win. There were at least 
a hundred merchant ships to every one of our troopships; if 
a considerable number of the former could be sunk, Germany 
would have scored a decisive advantage. From the declara- 
tion of submarine warfare, the objective of the German 
Admiralty had been for "tonnage"; by March, 1918, as 
already said, the chances of destroying sufficient tonnage to 
win had become extremely slight; yet it still represented 
the one logical mission of the submarine. 

The two alternatives, however, that of attacking mercan- 
tile convoys or troop convoys, hardly existed in fact. Let us 
suppose for a moment that the Germans had changed their 
programme, had taken their group of operating submarines 
from the northern trade routes, and had stationed them to the 
south, in the track of the troop transports. What would the 
results have been? "Lane," though a convenient word for 
descriptive purposes, is hardly an accurate one; for this ocean 
passageway was really about 200 miles wide. Imagine eight 
or ten submarines, stretched across that expanse and hunting 
for troopships. At this rate the Germans would have had 
about one submarine for every twenty miles. Instead of 
finding themselves sailing amid a swarm of surface ships, as 
they were when they were stationed in the busy trade routes 



36o THE VICTORY At SEA 

of the Irish Sea or the English Channel, the submarines would 
have found themselves drifting on a great waste of waters. 
Our troop convoys averaged not more than three a week even 
in the busiest period; in all probability the submarines would 
therefore have hung around for a month without catching 
a glimpse of one. Even if by some chance the patient vigil 
should finally have been rewarded, it is extremely unlikely 
that the submarine would ever have found a favorable 
opportunity to attack. We must keep in mind that the 
convoy room at the Admiralty knew, within certain limits, 
the location of submarines from day to day; any time one 
was located in the track of a troop convoy, therefore, a wire- 
less to the convoy would have conveyed this information and 
directed it to reach the coast of France by another route. 

At the beginning the speediest vessels only were used 
for transporting troops. Ships which made less than 12 
knots an hour were not deemed safe for such precious cargoes; 
when the need for troops became more and more pressing 
and when our transport service had demonstrated great skill 
in the work, a few slower vessels were used; but the great 
majority of our troop transports were those which made 
twelve knots or more. Now one of the greatest protections 
which a ship possesses against submarine attack is unques- 
tionably high speed. A submarine makes only eight knots 
when submerged — and it must submerge immediately if its 
attack is to be successful. It must be within at least a mile 
of its quarry when it discharges its torpedo; and most success- 
ful attacks were made within three hundred yards. Now 
take a pencil and a piece of paper and figure out what must 
be the location of a submarine, having a speed of eight knots, 
when it sights a convoy, which makes twelve knots and 
more, if it hopes to approach near enough to launch a torpedo. 
A little diagramming will prove that the U-boat must be 
almost directly in line of its hoped-for victim if it is to score 
a hit. But even though the god of Chance should favor 
the enemy in this way, the likelihood of sinking its prey 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 361 

would still be very remote. Like all convoys, the troopships 
began zigzagging as soon as they entered the danger zone; 
and this in itself made it almost impossible for a submarine 
to get its bearings and take good aim. I believe that these 
circumstances in themselves — the comparative scarcity of 
troop transports, the width of the "lane" in which they trav- 
elled, the high speed which they maintained, and their 
constant zigzagging, would have defeated most of the 
attempts which the Germans could have made to torpedo 
them. Though I think that most of them would have reached 
their destinations unharmed without any other protection, 
still this risk, small as it was, could not be taken; and we 
therefore gave them one other protection greater than any 
of those which I have yet mentioned — the destroyer escort. 
A convoy of four or five large troopships would be surrounded 
by as many as ten or a dozen destroyers. Very properly, 
since they were carrying human cargoes, we gave them an 
escort at least three times as large per vessel as that given 
to large mercantile convoys of 20 or more vessels; and this 
fact made them very uninviting baits for the most venture- 
some U-boat commanders. 

When the engineers build a Brooklyn bridge they introduce 
an element which they call the factor of safety. It is their 
usual procedure to estimate the greatest weight which their 
structure may be called upon to bear under any conceivable 
circumstances and then they make it strong enough to stand 
a number of times that weight. This additional strength is 
the "factor of safety"; it is never called into use, of course, 
but the consciousness that it exists gives the public a 
sense of security which it could obtain in no other way. 
We adopted a similar policy in transporting these mil- 
lions of American boys to Europe. We also had a large 
margin of safety. We did not depend upon one precaution 
to assure the lives of our soldiers; we heaped one pre- 
cautionary measure on another. From the embarking of the 
troops at New York or at Hampton Roads to the disembark- 



362 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

ation at Brest, St. Nazaire, La Pallice, Bordeaux, or at one 
of their other destinations, not the minutest safeguard was 
omitted. We necessarily thus somewhat diminished the 
protection of some of the mercantile convoys — and properly 
so. This was done whenever the arrival of a troop convoy 
conflicted with the arrival of a merchant convoy. Also, until 
they reached the submarine zone, they were attended by a 
cruiser or a battleship whose business it was to protect them 
against a German raider which might possibly have made 
its escape into the ocean; the work performed by these ocean 
escorts, practically all of which were American, was for the 
most part unobtrusive and unspectacular, but it constitutes 
a particularly fine example of efficiency and seamanlike de- 
votion. At Berehaven, Ireland, as described above, we had 
stationed three powerful American dreadnaughts, moment- 
arily prepared to rush to the scene in case one of the great 
German battle-cruisers succeeded in breaking into the open 
sea. Even the most minute precautions were taken by the 
transports. 

The soldiers and crews were not permitted to throw any- 
thing overboard which might betray the course of a convoy; 
the cook's refuse was dropped at a particular time and in a 
way that would furnish no clew to a lurking submarine; even 
a tin can, if thrown into the sea, was first pierced with holes 
to make sure that it would sink. Any one who struck a 
match at night in the danger zone committed a punishable 
ofi^ense. It is thus apparent why the Germans never 
"landed" a single one of our transports. The records show 
only three or four cases in which even attempts were made 
to do this; and those few efforts were feeble and ineffectual. 
Of course, the boys all had exciting experiences with phantom 
submarines; indeed I don't suppose that there is a single one 
of our more than 2,000,000 troops who has not entertained 
his friends and relatives with accounts of torpedo streaks 
and schools of U-boats. 

But the Germans made no concerted campaign against 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 363 

our transports; fundamental conditions, already described, 
rendered such an oflFensive hopeless ; and the skill with which 
our transport service was organized and conducted likewise 
dissuaded them. I have always believed that the German 
Admiralty ordered their U-boat captains to let the American 
.transports alone; or at least not to attack except under very 
favorable circumstances, and this belief is rather confirmed 
by a passage in General Ludendorff's memoirs. "From our 
previous experience with the submarine war," General 
Ludendorff writes, " I expected strong forces of Americans to 
come, but the rapidity with which they actually did arrive 
proved surprising. General von Cramon, the German mili- 
tary plenipotentiary with the Imperial and Royal Headquar- 
ters, often called me up and asked me to assist in the sinking 
of American troopships; public opinion in Austria- Hungary 
demanded it. Admiral von Holtzendorff could only reply 
that everything was being done to reduce enemy tonnage 
and to sink troopships. It was not possible to direct the 
submarine against the troopships exclusively. They could 
approach the coast of Europe anywhere between the north 
of England and Gibraltar, a front of some fourteen hundred 
nautical miles. It was impossible eflFectively to close this 
area by means of submarines. One could have concentrated 
them only on certain routes; but whether the troopships 
would choose the same routes at the same time was the ques- 
tion. As soon as the enemy heard of submarines anywhere 
he could always send the ships new orders by wireless and 
unload at another port. It was, therefore, not certain that 
by this method we should meet with a sufficient number of 
troopships. The destruction of the enemy's freight tonnage 
would then have been undertaken only spasmodically, and 
would have been set back in an undesirable manner; and in 
that way the submarine war would have become diverted 
from its original object. The submarine war with commerce 
was therefore continued with all vigor possible." 
Apparently it became the policy of the German Admiralty, 



364 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

as I have said, to concentrate their U-boats on merchant 
shipping and leave the American troopships practically alone 
— at least those bound to Europe. Unfortunately, however, 
at no time did we have enough destroyers to provide escorts 
for all of these transports as fast as they were unloaded and 
ready to return to America, but as time in the "turn around" 
was the all-important consideration in getting the troops 
over, the transports were sent back through the submarine 
zone under the escort of armed yachts, and occasionally not 
escorted at all. Under these conditions the transports could 
be attacked with much less risk, as was shown by the fact 
that five were torpedoed, though of these happily only three 
were sunk. 

Ill 

THE position of the German naval chiefs, as is shown by 
the quotation from General Ludendorflf's book, was an 
extremely unhappy one. They had blatantly promised the 
German people that their submarines would prevent the 
transportation of American troops to Europe. At first they 
had ridiculed the idea that undisciplined, unmilitary America 
could ever organize an army; after we adopted conscription 
and began to train our young men by the millions, they just 
as vehemently proclaimed that this army could never be 
landed in Europe. In this opinion the German military 
chieftains were not alone. No such army movement had 
ever before been attempted. The discouraging forecast 
made by a brilliant British naval authority in July, 19 17, re- 
flected the ideas of too many military people on both sides of 
the ocean. "I am distressed," he said, "at the fact that it 
appears to me to be impossible to provide enough shipping to 
bring the American army over in hundreds of thousands to 
France, and, after they are brought over, to supply the enor- 
mous amount of shipping which will be required to keep them 
full up with munitions, food, and equipment." 

It is thus not surprising that the German people accepted 
as gospel the promises of their Admiralty; therefore their 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 365 

anger was unbounded when American troops began to arrive. 
The German newspapers began to ask the most embarrassing 
questions. What had become of their submarines? Had 
the German people not been promised that their U-boats 
would sink any American troopships that attempted to 
cross the ocean? As the shipments increased, and as the 
effect of these vigorous fresh young troops began to be mani- 
fest upon the Western Front, the outcries in Germany waxed 
even more fierce and abusive. Von Capelle and other 
German naval chiefs made rambling speeches in the Reich- 
stag, once more promising their people that the submarines 
would certainly win the war — speeches that were followed 
by ever-increasing arrivals of American soldiers in France. 
The success of our transports led directly to the fall of Von 
Capelle as Minister of Marine; his successor. Admiral von 
Mann, who was evidently driven to desperation by the 
popular outburst, decided to make one frantic attempt to 
attack our men. The new minister, of course, knew that he 
could accomplish no definite results; but the sinking of even 
one transport with several thousand troops on board would 
have had a tremendous effect upon German morale. When 
the great British liner Justicia was torpedoed, the German 
Admiralty officially announced that it was the Leviathan, 
filled with American soldiers; and the jubilation which fol- 
lowed in the German press, and the subsequent dejection 
when it was learned that this was a practically empty trans- 
port, sailing westward, showed that an actual achievement 
of this kind would have raised their drooping spirits. Admiral 
von Mann, therefore, took several submarines away from the 
trade routes and sent them into the transport zone. But 
they did not succeed even in attacking a single east-bound 
troopship. The only result accomplished was the one 
which, from what I have already said, would have been ex- 
pected; the removal of the submarines from the commercial 
lane caused a great fall in the sinking of merchant ships. 
In August, 1 9 18, these sinkings amounted to 280,000 tons; 



366 THE VICTORY AT SEA 

in September and October, when this futile drive was made 
at American transports, the sinkings fell to 190,000 and 
1 10,000 tons. 

Too much praise cannot be given to the commanders of 
our troop convoys and the commanding officers of the troop 
transports, as well as the commanders of the cruisers and 
battleships that escorted them from America to the western 
edge of the submarine zone. The success of their valuable 
services is evidence of a high degree not only of nautical 
skill, judgment, and experience, but of the admirable seaman- 
ship displayed under the very unusual conditions of steaming 
without lights while continuously manoeuvring in close for- 
mation. Moreover, their cordial cooperation with the escorts 
sent to meet them was everything that could be desired. 
In this invaluable service these commanding officers had the 
loyal and enthusiastic support of the admirable petty officers 
and men whose initiative, energy, and devotion throughout 
the war enabled us to accomplish results which were not only 
beyond our expectations but which demonstrated that they 
are second to none in the world in the qualities which make 
for success in war on the sea. 

On the whole, the safeguarding of American soldiers on the 
ocean was an achievement of the American navy. Great 
Britain provided a slightly larger amount of tonnage for this 
purpose than the United States; but about 82 per cent, of 
the escorting was done by our own forces. The cruiser 
escorts across the ocean to France were almost entirely 
American; and the destroyer escorts through the danger 
zone were likewise nearly all our own work. And in per- 
forming this great feat the American navy fulfilled its 
ultimate duty in the war. The transportation of these 
American troops brought the great struggle to an end. On 
the battlefield they acquitted themselves in a way that 
aroused the admiration of their brothers in the naval service. 
When we were reading, day by day, the story of their achieve- 
ments, when we saw the German battle lines draw nearer 



TRANSPORTING U. S. TROOPS 367 

and nearer to the Rhine, and, finally, when the German 
Government raised its hands in abject surrender, the eigh- 
teen months' warfare against the German submarines, in 
which the American navy had been privileged to play 
its part, appeared in its true light — as one of the greatest 
victories against the organized forces of evil in all history. 



THE END 



APPENDIX 



APPENDIX I 

OFFICIAL AUTHORIZATION TO PUBLISH 
"THE VICTORY AT SEA" 

U. S. NAVAL WAR COLLEGE, 
NEWPORT, RHODE ISLAND 

14 June 1919, 

From: Rear Admiral Wm. S. Sims, U. S. Navy. 

To : The Secretary of the Navy. 

Subject: Requests Permission to Publish a Book on the Activi- 
ties of the U. S. Navy during The Great War. 

Reference (a): Paragraph 1534 of the Articles for the Govern- 
ment of the Navy of the United States. 

1. In accordance with the provisions of reference (a) I request 
authority to publish in my name a book descriptive of the activi- 
ties of the U. S. Naval Forces operating in European waters during 
The Great War. 

2. My object in preparing this book is to familiarize the Amer- 
ican people with the great work accomplished by the Navy during 
the war. It will be a popular presentation written in a non- 
technical style, illustrated with photographs taken in Europe 
and various diagrams indicating the nature of our activities. 

|sl Wm. S. Sims. 
9 July 1919. 

APPROVED. 
Is] Josephus Daniels. 

HWS-MEF 2nd Indorsement. 

OFFICE OF NAVAL INTELLIGENCE 

Washington, D. C. 
From: Director of Naval IntelHgence. 11 July 1919. 

To: President Naval War College. 
I . Forwarded. 

|s| A. P. NiBLACK. 

371 



372 APPENDIX 

THE SECRETARY OF THE NAVY, 
WASHINGTON 

June 26, 1919. 
My DEAR Admiral: 

I am sending you in the regular official course my approval of 
your plan to print and publish a book relative to the operations of 
the naval forces under your command during the great war. I 
am happy that you are going to undertake this, because I am sure 
it will be of great value to the Navy and of interest to the world. 
With sentiments of esteem and high regard. 

Sincerely yours, 

|s| JosEPHUS Daniels. 

P. S. 

Of course any facilities or assistance that the Navy Department 
can render you will be at your disposal 

Rear Admiral W. S. Sims, U. S. N., 
President Naval War College, 
Newport, Rhode Island. 



Extract from Navy Regulations, \g\^, Article 1534 

" (2) No person belonging to the Navy or employed under the 
Navy Department shall publish or cause or permit to be published, 
directly or indirectly, or communicate by interviews, private 
letters, or otherwise, except as required by his official duties, any 
information in regard to the foreign policy of the United States, 
or concerning the acts or measures of any department of the 
Government or of any officer acting thereunder, or any comments 
or criticisms thereon; or the text of any official instructions, re- 
ports, or letters upon any subject whatever, or furnish copies 
thereof to any person, without the express permission of the Navy 
Department. 

" (4) Nothing in this article shall be construed as prohibiting 
officers from forwarding to the department, through official chan- 
nels, well-considered comment and suggestions with a view to 
promoting the efficiency of the service and the public interests; on 



APPENDIX 373 

the contrary, such suggestions are invited, but they should be in 
regard to things or methods and not a criticism of persons, and 
should in all cases be accompanied by a well-digested plan for im- 
provement. Such suggestions, if approved by the department, 
will be entered on the officer's record and he will be duly notified to 
that effect." 



374 APPENDIX 

APPENDIX II 

FIRST CABLE MESSAGE TO WASHINGTON 

To: Secretary of the Navy 
Sent April 14, 19 17. 

Through: State Department. 

File No. 25-9-2 

The situation is as follows : 

The submarine issue is very much more serious than the people 
realize in America. The recent success of operations and the rapidity 
of construction constitute the real crisis of the war. The morale of 
the enemy submarines is not broken, only about fifty-four are 
known to have been captured or sunk and no voluntary surrenders 
have been recorded. The reports of our press are greatly in 
error. Recent reports circulated concerning surrenders are 
simply to depreciate enemy morale and results are [not] very 
satisfactory. 

Supplies and communications of forces all fronts, including 
the Russians, are threatened and control of the sea actually 
imperilled. 

German submarines are constantly extending their operations 
into the Atlantic, increasing areas and the difficulty of patrolling. 
Russian situation critical. Baltic fleet mutiny, eighty-five ad- 
mirals, captains, and commanders murdered, and in some armies 
there is insubordination. 

The amount of British, neutral and Allied shipping lost in 
February was 536,000 tons, in March, 571,000 tons, and in the 
first ten days of April 205,000 tons. With short nights and better 
weather these losses are increasing. 

The British forces could not effectively prevent the escape of 
some raiders during the long nights, but the chances are better 
now. 

The Allies were notified that hospital ships will continue to be 
sunk, this in order to draw destroyers away from operations against 
submarines to convoy hospital ships; in this way causing a large 
demand for large convoy forces in all areas not before necessary, 
and also partially immobilizing the main fleet. 



APPENDIX 375 

On account of the immense theatre and the length and number of 
lines of communication, and the material deterioration resulting 
from three years' continuous operation in distant fields with in- 
adequate base facilities, the strength of the naval forces is danger- 
ously strained. This applies to all of the sea forces outside of the 
Grand Fleet. The enemy has six large and sixty-four small 
submarine mine layers; the latter carry eighteen mines and the 
former thirty-four, also torpedoes and guns. All classes sub- 
marines for actual commission completed at a rate approaching 
three per week. To accelerate and insure defeat of the submarine 
campaign immediate active cooperation absolutely necessary. 

The issue is and must inevitably be decided at the focus of all 
lines of communications in the Eastern Atlantic, therefore I very 
urgently recommend the following immediate naval cooperation. 

Maximum number of destroyers to be sent, accompanied by 
small anti-submarine craft; the former to patrol designated 
high seas area westward of Ireland, based on Queenstown, with an 
advance base at Bantry Bay, latter to be an inshore patrol for 
destroyers: small craft should be of light draft with as high speed 
as possible but low speed also useful. Also repair ships and staff 
for base. Oil and docks are available but I advise sending contin- 
uous supply of fuel. German main fleet must be contained, de- 
manding maximum conservation of the British main fleet. South 
of Scotland no base is so far available for this force. 

At present our battleships can serve no useful purpose in this 
area, except that two divisions of dreadnaughts might be based on 
Brest for moral effect against anticipated raids by heavy enemy 
ships in the channel out of reach of the British main fleet. 

The chief other and urgent practical cooperation is merchant 
tonnage and a continuous augmentation of anti-submarine craft 
to reinforce our advanced forces. There is a serious shortage of the 
latter craft. For towing the present large amount of sailing ton- 
nage through dangerous areas sea-going tugs would be of great use. 

The cooperation outlined above should be expedited with the 
utmost dispatch in order to break the enemy submarine morale and 
accelerate the accomplishment of the chief American objective. 

It is very likely the enemy will make submarine mine laying raids 
on our coast or in the Caribbean to divert attention and to keep our 
forces from the critical areas in the Eastern Atlantic through 



376 APPENDIX 

eflFect upon public opinion. The diflficulty of maintaining sub- 
marine bases and the focussing of shipping on this side will restrict 
such operations to minor importance, although they should be effec- 
tively opposed, principally by keeping the Channel swept on 
soundings. Enemy submarine mines have been anchored as deep 
as ninety fathoms but majority at not more than fifty fathoms. 
Mines do not rise from the bottom to set depth until from twenty- 
four to forty-eight hours after they have been laid. 

So far all experience shows that submarines never lay mines out 
of sight of landmarks or lights on account of danger to themselves 
if location is not known. Maximum augmentation merchant 
tonnage and anti-submarine work where most effective constitute 
the paramount immediate necessity. 

Mr. Hoover informs that there is only sufficient grain supply in 
this country for three weeks. This does not include the supply in 
retail stores. In a few days Mr. Hoover will sail for the United 
States. 

Sims. 

APPENDIX III 

FIRST DETAILED REPORT ON THE ALLIED 
NAVAL SITUATION 

London, England, 

April 19, 1917. 

From: — Rear Admiral Wm. S. Sims, U. S. N. 
To: — Secretary of the Navy. 

Subject: Confirmation and elaboration of recent cablegrams 
concerning War situation and recommendations for U. S. 
Naval cooperation. 

I. Reception: 

My reception in this country has been exceptionally cordial and 
significant of the seriousness of present situation and the import- 
ance to be attached to the United States' entry into the war. 

I was met at Liverpool by Rear Admiral Hope, R. N., a member 
of Admiral Jellicoe's staff, and the Admiral of the Port, the former 
having been sent by the Admiralty to escort me to London. A 



APPENDIX 377 

special train was provided which made a record run, and within a 
few hours after arrival in London 1 was received by the First Sea 
Lord and his principal assistants in a special conference. 

2. Conferences: 

More or less hesitancy was noted at first in presenting a full 
statement of the true situation, particularly (as it developed 
later) on account of its seriousness, combined with a natural 
reluctance against appearing to seek assistance, and a hesitancy in 
taking chances of allowing information indirectly to reach the 
enemy, and thereby improve enemy morale. 

1 therefore positively took the position that 1 must be con- 
sidered a part of the Admiralty organization, and that it was 
essential to safe and efficient cooperation that 1 be trusted with a 
full knowledge of the exact situation. 

They finally consented, only after reference to the Imperial War 
Council, to my exposing the true state of affairs both as regards the 
military situation and rate of destruction of merchant shipping. 

I have had daily conferences with the First Sea Lord, both at 
his office and residence, and also have been given entire freedom of 
the Admiralty and access to all Government Officials. 1 have 
freely consulted with such officials as the following: 

Prime Minister. 

First Lord of Admiralty (Sir Edward Carson). 

Ministers of Munitions, Shipping, Trade, and other Cabinet 
officials. 

First Sea Lord, and his assistants. 

Chief of Naval Staff. 

Directors (corresponding to our Chiefs of Bureaus) of Intelli- 
gence, Anti-submarine operations, Torpedoes, Mines, Mining, etc. 

3. General Statement of the Situation: 

Since the last declaration of the enemy Government, which from 
intelligence information was anticipated, the submarine campaign 
against merchant shipping of all Nations has resolved itself into the 
real issue of the war and, stated briefly, the Allied Governments 
have not been able to, and are not now, effectively meeting the 
situation presented. 

4. As stated in my first despatch, the communications and 
supplies to all forces on all fronts, including Russian, are 
threatened, and the "Command of the Sea" is actually at stake. 



378 APPENDIX 

5. My own views of the seriousness of the situation and the 
submarine menace have been greatly altered. My convictions and 
opinions, as probably those of the Department also, had been 
largely based upon Press reports and reports of our Attaches and 
other professional Americans who have been abroad during the 
War. All of this information has been either rigidly censored or 
else has been given out in such form that it would be of minimum 
assistance to enemy morale. 

6. The necessity for secrecy, which the British Government has 
experienced, and which 1 repeatedly encounter in London, and 
even in the Admiralty itself, is impressive. There have been re- 
markable and unexpected leakages of information throughout the 
war. Certain neutral legations of smaller countries are now under 
strong suspicion. 

7. The extent to which the submarine campaign is being waged 
is in itself excellent evidence of the importance attached to it by 
the enemy, and of the degree to which they counted, and still are 
counting, upon it. 

The Intelligence Department has reliable information (as reli- 
able as can be) that the enemy really reckoned that the Allies 
would be defeated in two months through shortage of supplies. 

8. With improved weather and the shorter nights now coming on 
we may expect even more enemy submarine success. 

9. The Commander-in-Chief of the Grand Fleet was yesterday 
in conference in the Admiralty as to what greater extent de- 
stroyers and auxiliaries of the Fleet may be utilized without 
endangering its power in the remote possibility of another fleet 
engagement. 

The consensus of opinion seems to be that the latter will not 
occur, but there is not complete unanimity in this belief, and of 
course, in any case, the possibility must be adequately and con- 
tinuously provided against. 

General discussion oj situation: 

10. I delayed [four days] forwarding my first report of the situ- 
ation with a view of obtaining the maximum information consistent 
with the importance of the time element. 1 was also somewhat 
deterred by a natural reluctance to alter so radically my precon- 
ceived views and opinions as to the situation. 

1 1 . The evidence is conclusive that, regardless of any enemy 



APPENDIX 379 

diversions such as raids on our coasts or elsewhere, the critical 
area in which the war's decision will be made is in the eastern 
Atlantic at the focus of all lines of communications. 

The known number of enemy submarines and their rate of con- 
struction, allowing liberal factors for errors of information, 
renders it inevitable that the main submarine effort must continue 
to be concentrated in the above critical area. 

12. Even in this critical area, it is manifest that the field is 
relatively large for the maximum number of submarines which the 
enemy can maintain in it. For example, with the present Ad- 
miralty policy (explained below) they are forced to cover all the 
possible trade routes of approach between the north of Scotland and 
Ushant. 

13. From consideration of the above and all other essential in- 
formation available, it is apparent that the enemy could not dis- 
perse his main submarine campaign into other quarters of the 
Globe without diminishing results in this and all areas to a degree 
which would mean failure to accomplish the Mission of the sub- 
marine campaign, which can be nothing else than a final decision 
of the war. 

14. Considerable criticism has been, and still is, concentrated 
upon the Admiralty for not taking more effective steps and for 
failing to produce more substantial and visible results. One of the 
principal demands is for convoys of merchant shipping, and more 
definite and real protection within the war zone. 

The answer, which manifestly is not publicly known, is simply 
that the necessary vessels are not available, and further that those 
which are available are suffering from the effects of three years of 
arduous service. 

15. It is insistently asked (was asked by myself) why shipping 
is not directed to and concentrated at various rendezvous and from 
these convoyed through the dangerous areas. The answer is the 
same — the area is too large; the necessary vessels are not available. 

16. However, I am now consulting with the Director of Shipping 
as to the practicability and advisability of attempting some ap- 
proach to such a plan in case the United States is able to put in 
operation sufficient tonnage to warrant it. 

17. After trying various methods of controlling shipping, the 
Admiralty now believes the best policy to be one of dispersion. 



38o APPENDIX 

They use about six relatively large avenues or arcs of approach to 
the United Kingdom and Channel, changing their limits or area 
periodically if necessity demands. 

Generally speaking, one is to the north of Scotland, another to 
the north of Ireland, and three or four others covering the Irish 
Sea and Channel. Individual ships coming into any of these areas 
of approach are instructed, generally before sailing, to cross the 
twentieth meridian at certain and different latitudes and thence 
steer certain courses to port. 

At times in the past they have found one of these avenues of 
approach free of submarines under such conditions as to lead them 
to concentrate shipping therein, but invariably the enemy has 
become aware of the course pursued. 

1 8. The great difficulty in any method of shipping control is 
communication with the shipping itself and full cooperation by the 
merchant personnel. The moment a ship is captured the code 
either becomes dangerous or useless. The merchant code is being 
continually changed, and at all times it cannot be counted upon for 
more than a fortnight. The immense difficulty of changing the 
code and keeping shipping all over the world in touch with changes 
is apparent. 

19. Continual trouble is experienced with some merchant 
Captains taking the law into their own hands and exhibiting 
contempt, or at least indifference, for Admiralty instructions. 
The American Liner New York upon which I took passage furnishes 
a typical example. She was instructed to make Fastnet Light at 
daylight but she passed it about nine p. m., thus passing in day- 
light through the most dangerous area. 

20. The Admiralty has had frequent conferences with Merchant 
masters and sought their advice. Their most unanimous demand 
is " Give us a gun and let us look out for ourselves." They are also 
insistent that it is impracticable for merchant vessels to proceed in 
formation, at least in any considerable numbers, due principally to 
difficulty in controlling their speed and to the inexperience of their 
subordinate officers. With this view I do not personally agree but 
believe that with a little experience merchant vessels could safely 
and sufficiently well steam in open formations. 

21. The best protection against the submarine menace for all 
classes of ships, merchant as well as Naval, is SPEED and ZIG- 



APPENDIX 381 

ZAGG ING, not more than fifteen minutes on a course. Upon this 
point no one disagrees, but on the contrary there is absolutely 
unanimity of opinion. 

22. In the absence of adequate patrol craft, particularly de-' 
stroyers, and until the enemy submarine morale is broken, there is 
but one sure method of meeting the submarine issue upon which 
there is also complete unanimity — increased number of merchant 
bottoms preferably small. 

"More Ships! More Ships! More Ships!" is heard on every 
hand. 

23. It is also significant that until very recently the Admiralty 
have been unable completely to convince some members of the 
Cabinet that the submarine issue is the deciding factor in the War. 
The civilian mind, here as at home, is loath to believe in unseen 
dangers, particularly until the pinch is felt in real physical ways. 

24. The Prime Minister only two days ago expressed to me the 
opinion that it ought to be possible to find physical means of 
absolutely sealing up all escape for submarines from their own 
ports. The fact that all such methods (nets, mines, obstructions, 
etc.) inherently involve the added necessity of continuous protec- 
tion and maintenance by our own Naval forces is seldom under- 
stood and appreciated. I finally convinced the Prime Minister of 
the fallacy of such propositions by describing the situations into 
which we would be led: namely, that in order to maintain our 
obstructions we would have to match the forces the enemy brought 
against them until finally the majority if not all of our forces would 
be forced into dangerous areas where they would be subject to 
continual torpedo and other attack, in fact in a position most 
favorable to the enemy. 

25. Entirely outside of the fact that the enemy does, and always 
can, force exits, and thereby nullify the close blockade, the 
weather is a serious added difficulty. The heaviest anchors 
obtainable have been used for nets, mines, and obstructions, only 
to have the arduous work of weeks swept away in a few hours of 
heavy weather. Moorings will not hold. They chafe through. 
In this respect we could be of great assistance, i. e., in supply of 
moorings and buoys. 

26. The Channel is not now, and never has been, completely 
sealed against submarine egress, let alone the vaster areas of 



382 APPENDIX 

escape to the north. Submarines have gone under mine-fields, and 
have succeeded in unknown ways in evading and cutting through 
nets and obstructions. 

27. In addition to submarines, heavy forces are free to raid, and 
in fact escape through, the Channel at any time when the enemy 
decides that the necessity or return will justify the risk. Hence 
the suggestion that two divisions of our fast Dreadnaughts might 
be based upon Brest, primarily for the resulting moral effect 
against such possible raids. 

I was told yesterday by an important Admiralty official that 
while he thought the chances of raids in, or escape through, the 
Channel by heavy enemy forces out of reach of the Grand Fleet 
(North of Scotland) were very remote, nevertheless the possibility 
existed and was principally thwarted on moral grounds, that is, the 
uncertainty in his mind of the opposition which would be en- 
countered. He agreed with others, including the First Sea Lord, 
that the addition of some of our heavy forces to those maintained 
in southern Channel approaches by the French and British would 
undoubtedly entirely preclude the possibility of such raids. 

28. Submarine Losses. 

It has been found necessary to accept no reports of submarine 
losses as authentic and certain unless survivors are captured or the 
submarine itself is definitely located by dragging. No dependence 
even is placed upon evidence of oil on the surface after a submarine 
has been attacked and forced down, as there is reason to believe 
that when an enemy submarine dives to escape gunfire she is 
fitted to expel oil for the particular purpose of conveying the im- 
pression that she has been sunk and thereby avoid further pursuit. 
It has been shown that the amount of damage a submarine can 
stand is surprising and much more than was anticipated before 
the experience of the war. Upon a recent occasion a British sub- 
marine was mistaken for an enemy and though struck by several 
shell, dove and escaped to port. 

The submarine losses which are certain since outbreak of war are 
as given in attached cablegram. 

It is estimated that between thirty and forty submarines operate 
at a time in the waters surrounding the British Islands and French 
Coast. At least one is now known to be on White Sea trade lanes. 

29. Best anti-submarine weapons: 



APPENDIX 383 

One of the most efficient weapons now used by all destroyers and 
patrol craft against submarines is the so-called " Depth Charge," 
sample and drawings of which have been forwarded by our Naval 
Attache. These are merely explosive charges designed to explode 
at a certain depth, formerly eighty feet, now about one hundred 
feet. They are dropped overboard where a submarine that has 
submerged is assumed to be and are counted upon to badly shake 
up and demoralize if they do not actually cause serious damage. 

Howitzers and Bomb-throwers of large calibre are under con- 
struction, designed to throw similar depth charges to distances of 
about 2000 yards. Details will be forwarded. 

30. Torpedo Protection: 

This subject may be summed up by the statement of the Captain 
of a British Dreadnaught who said in effect that after a year's 
experience he did not fear being sunk by a torpedo. Unless struck 
by several the worst to be anticipated is damage to shafts or rudder 
thus necessitating towing. Cruisers have often been struck and 
been able to reach port. Vital water-tight doors are kept con- 
tinuously closed at sea. 

Destroyer officers have been heard to express the curious opinion 
that the enemy ships were more or less unsinkable. This is prob- 
ably to be explained by the fact that they carry very few supplies; 
that they have their storage spaces compartmented or filled with 
wood or other water excluding material ; and that when in port, they 
quarter their crews in barracks, and when leaving for a cruise carry 
the minimum amount of berthing and supply facilities. These 
points, however, are not positively known. 

On the contrary, all vessels of the British Fleet must be kept 
fully supplied and fueled at all times for extended cruising. This 
is particularly true of Battle Cruisers and Cruisers. 

31. All officers of rank and actual experience consulted are 
convinced that the enemy have no unusual methods of protection, 
or in fact any "surprises" in ordnance or other fighting equipment. 

32. All are agreed that the best protection against torpedoes is 
SPEED and ZIGZAGGING. 

33. It is a common experience of the Naval as well as Merchant 
service that torpedo wakes are reported where none exist. Many 
reports are received of torpedoes barely missing ships. This was 
true in the Jutland Battle. The Captain on one Battleship said 



384 APPENDIX 

that he received numerous reports of torpedoes passing just ahead 
and just astern, nearly all of which he had reason to believe did not 
exist. 

Streaks of suds, slicks, etc., are very deceiving and are easily 
mistaken for torpedo wakes, particularly when the danger of 
torpedoes is present. This accounts for many reports by passengers 
on liners and other merchant craft of seeing many torpedoes just 
miss their mark. 

34. Submarine versus Submarine: 

There has always been opposition to using submarines against 
submarines, principally on the grounds that the possibilities of 
their accomplishments would not be sufficiently great to justify the 
risk involved of mistaken identity and resulting damage to friends. 

The Director of Anti-Submarine Warfare believes, however, 
that such operations promise well, and the experiment is now 
being tried with as many submarines as can be spared from the 
Grand Fleet. Some enemy submarines have been destroyed by 
this method, usually torpedoed. One valuable feature of this 
method lies in the fact that as long as our submarines are not so 
used, the enemy submarine is always perfectly safe in assuming 
that all submarines sighted are friends. If this certainty is removed 
the enemy will be forced to keep down more, and to take much 
greater precautions against detections. This is an advantage of no 
small amount. 

In addition to the possible offensive work that may be accomp- 
lished by our submarines on such duty, the plan furnishes us with 
more reliable information as to the limitations and capabilities of 
enemy vessels under the actual conditions existing in the areas in 
which they operate. Without this knowledge based on actual 
experience too much is left to conjecture which is liable to lead to a 
great deal of misdirected effort. 

(Signed) Wm. S. Sims. 



APPENDIX 385 

APPENDIX IV 
THE QUESTION OF ARMING MERCHANT SHIPS 

To: Secretary of the Navy. 

Through Admiralty. From Queenstown. 

Sent: June 28, 191 7. 

Admiralty for Secretary Navy Washington, providing it meet!) 

Admiralty's full approval. 

From Admiral Sims. 

Referring to Department's opinion, reported in last two cables, to 
the effect that adequate armament and trained crews constitute 
one of the most effective defensive anti-submarine measures, I again 
submit with all possible stress the following based on extended 
[Allied] war experience. The measures demanded, if enemy defeat in 
time is to be assured, are not defensive but offensive defensive. 
The merchantman's inherent weakness is lack of speed and pro- 
tection. Guns are no defense against torpedo attack without 
warning, which is necessarily the enemy method of attack against 
armed ships. In this area alone during the last six weeks thirty 
armed ships were sunk by torpedoes without submarine being seen, 
although three of these were escorted each by a single destroyer. 
The result would of course have been the same no matter how 
many guns these ships carried or what their calibre. Three 
mystery ships, heavily manned by expert naval crews with much 
previous experience with submarine attack, have recently been 
torpedoed without warning. Another case within the month of 
mystery ship engaging submarine with gun-fire at six thousand 
yards but submarine submerged and approached unseen and 
torpedoed ship at close range. The ineffectiveness of heaviest 
batteries against submarine attack is conclusively shown by 
Admiralty's practice always sending destroyers to escort their 
men-of-war. The comparative immunity of the relatively small 
number American ships, especially liners, is believed here to be 
due to the enemy's hopes that the pacifist movement will succeed. 
Cases are on record of submarines making successful gun attacks 
from advantageous sun position against armed ships without ship 
being able to see submarine. I submit that if submarine cam- 



386 APPENDIX 

paign is to be defeated it must be by offensive measures. The 
enemy submarine mission must be destruction of shipping and 
avoidance of anti-submarine craft. Enemy submarines are now 
using for their final approach an auxihary periscope less than two 
inches in diameter. This information just acquired. All of the 
experience in this submarine campaign to date demonstrates that 
it would be a seriously dangerous misapprehension to base our 
action on the assumption that any armament on merchantmen is 
any protection against submarines which are willing to use their 
torpedoes. The British have now definitely decided the adoption, 
to the maximum practicable extent, convoys from sixteen to twenty 
ships. This is an ofi^ensive measure against submarines, as the 
latter will be subject to the attack of our anti-submarine craft 
whenever they come within torpedoing distance of convoyed 
merchantmen. Moreover it permits of concentrated attack by 
our forces and obliges the enemy to disperse his forces to cover the 
various route of approach. 

Concerning Department's reference to a scheme for protection 
of merchant shipping which will not interfere with present escort 
duties, I submit that the time element alone prevents utilization of 
any new anti-submarine invention. The campaign may easily be 
lost before any such schemes can come into effective operation. 
The enemy is certainly counting on maximum effort being exerted 
before long nights and bad weather of autumn, that is, in next 
three months. Heaviest effort may be anticipated in July and 
August. 1 again submit that protection of our coastlines and of 
Allied shipping must necessarily be carried out in field of enemy 
activity if it is to be effective. The mission of the Allies must 
be to force submarines to give battle. Hence no operations in 
home waters should take precedence over, or be allowed to diminish, 
the maximum effort we can exert in area in which enemy is operat- 
ing, and must continue to operate in order to succeed. 

Sims. 



APPENDIX 387 

APPENDIX V 

THE ADVANTAGES OF THE CONVOY SYSTEM 

London, June 29, 191 7. 
From: Commander U. S, Naval Forces operating in European 

Waters. 
To: Secretary of the Navy (Operations.) 
Subject: General report concerning military situation. 

1 . I feel that there is little to add to my recent cable despatches 
which, in view of the importance of the time element, have been 
made full and detailed. 

2. To sum up my despatches briefly, I would repeat that I con- 
sider that the military situation is very grave indeed on account of 
the success of the enemy submarine campaign. 

If the shipping losses continue as they have during the past four 
months, it is submitted that the Allies will be forced to dire straits 
indeed, if they will not actually be forced into an unsatisfactory 
peace. 

The present rate of destruction is very much greater than the 
rat^ ,of building, and the. shortage of tonnage is already so great 
that the efficiency of the naval forces is already reduced by lack of 
oil. Orders have just been given to use three-fifths speed, except 
in cases of emergency. This simply means that the enemy is 
winning the war. 

3. My reasons for being so insistent in my cable despatches have 
been because of my conviction that measures of cooperation which 
we may take will be inefificient if they are not put into operation 
immediately, that is, within a month. 

There is every reason to believe that the maximum enemy sub- 
marine effort will occur between now and the first of November, 
reaching its height probably during the latter part of July, if not 
earlier. 

4. There is certainly no sovereign solution for the submarine 
menace except through well-established methods of warfare based 
upon fundamental military principles. 

5. It is submitted that the cardinal military principle of con- 
centration of effort is at present being pursued by the enemy and 
not by the Allies. 



388 APPENDIX 

6. We are dispersing our forces while the enemy is concentrating 
his. The enemy's submarine mission is and must continue to be 
the destruction of merchant shipping. The limitations of sub- 
marines and the distances over which they must operate prevent 
them from attacking our naval forces, that is, anti-submarine 
craft. They cannot afford to engage anti-submarine craft with 
guns; they must use torpedoes. If they should do so to any con- 
siderable extent their limited supply would greatly reduce their 
period of operation away from base, and the number of merchant- 
men they could destroy. Their object is to avoid contact with 
anti-submarine craft. This they can almost always do, as the 
submarine can see the surface craft at many times the distance the 
surface craft can see a periscope particularly one less than two 
inches in diameter. 

Moreover, the submarine greatly fears the anti-submarine craft 
because of the great danger of the depth charges. Our tactics 
should therefore be such as to force the submarine to incur this 
danger in order to get within range of merchantmen. 

7. It therefore seems to go without question that the only 
course for us to pursue is to revert to the ancient practice of convoy. 
This will be purely an offensive measure, because if we concentrate 
our shipping into convoys and protect it with our naval forces we 
will thereby force the enemy, in order to carry out his mission, to 
encounter naval forces which are not embarrassed with valuable 
cargoes, and which are a great danger to the submarine. At 
present our naval forces are wearing down their personnel and 
material in an attempted combination of escorting single ships, 
when they can be picked up, and also of attempting to seek and 
offensively engage an enemy whose object is to avoid such en- 
counters. With the convoy system the conditions will be reversed. 
Although the enemy may easily know when our convoys sail, he 
can never know the course they will pursue or the route of approach 
to their destinations. Our escorting forces will thus be able to 
work on a deliberate prearranged plan, preserving their oil sup- 
plies and energy, while the enemy will be forced to disperse his 
forces and seek us. In a word, the handicap we now labor under 
will be shifted to the enemy; we will have adopted the essential 
principal of concentration while the enemy will lose it. 

8. The most careful and thorough study of the convoy system 



APPENDIX 389 

made by the British Admiralty shows clearly that while we may 
have some losses under this system, owing to lack of adequate 
number of anti-submarine craft, they nevertheless will not be 
critical as they are at present. 

9. I again submit that if the Allied compaign is to be viewed as a 
whole, there is no necessity for any high sea protection on our own 
coast. The submarine as a type of war vessel possesses no un- 
usual characteristics different from those of other naval craft, with 
the single exception of its ability to submerge for a limited time. 
The difficulty of maintaining distant bases is the same for the sub- 
marine as it is for other craft. As long as we maintain control of 
the sea as far as surface craft are concerned, there can be no fear of 
the enemy establishing submarine bases in the Western Hemis- 
phere. 

10. To take an extreme illustration, if the enemy could be led or 
forced into diverting part of his submarine effort to the United 
States coast, or to any other area distant from the critical area 
surrounding the coast of France and the United Kingdom, the anti- 
submarine campaign would at once be won. The enemy labors 
under severe difficulties in carrying out his campaign, even in this 
restricted area, owing to the material limitations and the distances 
they must operate from their bases, through extremely dangerous 
locaUties. The extent of the United States coastline and the 
distances between its principal commercial ports preclude the 
possibility of any submarine effort in that part of the world except 
limited operations of diversion designed to affect public opinion, 
and thereby hold our forces from the vital field of action. 

1 1 . The difficulties confronting the convoy system are, of course, 
considerable. They are primarily involved in the widely dispersed 
ports of origin of merchant shipping; the difficulty of communica- 
tion by cable; the time involved by communications by mail; and 
the difficulties of obtaining a cooperation and coordination between 
Allied Governments. 

As reported by cable despatch, the British Government has 
definitely reached the decision to put the convoy system into 
operation as far as its ability goes. Convoys from Hampton 
Roads, Canada, Mediterranean, and Scandinavian countries are 
already in operation. Convoys from New York will be put in 
operation as soon as ships are available, The British navy is 



390 APPENDIX 

already strained beyond its capacity, and I therefore urgently 
recommend that we cooperate, at least to the extent of handling 
convoys from New York. 

12. The dangers to convoys from high sea raiders is remote, but, 
of course, must be provided against, and hence the necessity for 
escorting cruisers or reserve battleships. The necessity is even 
greater, however, for anti-submarine craft in the submarine war 
zone. 

13. As stated in my despatches, the arming of merchantmen is 
not a solution of the submarine menace, it serves the single purpose 
of forcing the submarine to use torpedoes instead of guns and 
bombs. The facts that men-of-war cannot proceed safely at sea 
without escort, and that in the Queenstown avenue of approach 
alone in the past six weeks there have been thirty armed merchant- 
men sunk, without having seen the submarine at all before the 
attack, seems to be conclusive evidence. A great mass of other 
evidence and war experience could be collected in support of the 
above. 

14. The week ending June 19th has been one of great submarine 
activity. Evidence indicates that fifteen to nineteen of the largest 
and latest submarines have been operating, of which ten to thirteen 
were operating in the critical area to the west and southwest of the 
British Isles. The above numbers are exclusive of the smaller and 
earlier type of submarines, and submarines carrying mines alone. 
Two submarines are working to the westward of the Straits of 
Gibraltar. A feature of the week was the sinking of ships as far 
west as nineteen degrees. Three merchant ship convoys are en 
route from Hampton Roads, the last one, consisting of eighteen 
ships, having sailed on the 19th of June. One hundred and sixteen 
moored mines have been swept up during the week. 

Twenty-two reports of encounters with enemy submarines in 
waters surrounding the United Kingdom have been reported dur- 
ing the week — three by destroyers, two by cruisers, two by mys- 
tery ships, one by French gunboat, three by submarines, nine by 
auxiliary patrol vessels, one by seaplane, and one by merchant 
vessel. 

There is attached copy of report of operations by anti-submarine 
craft based on Queenstown, , 

(Signed) Wm. S. Sims, 



APPENDIX 391 

APPENDIX VI 

THE NAVY DEPARTMENT'S POLICY 

From: Secretary of Navy. 

To: Vice-Admiral Sims, U. S. S. Melville. 

Received: July 10, .1917. 

The following letter from the Secretary to the Secretary of 
State is quoted for your information and guidance as an index of 
the policy of the Department in relation to the cooperation of our 
naval forces with those of our Allies. Quote after careful considera- 
tion of the present naval situation taken in connection with 
possible future situations which might arise, the Department is pre- 
paring to announce as its policy, in so far as it relates to the Allies. 
First, the most hearty cooperation with the Allies to meet the pres- 
ent submarine situation in European or other waters compatible 
with an adequate defence of our own home waters. Second, the 
most hearty cooperation with the Allies to meet any future situation 
arising during the present war period. Third, the realization that 
while a successful termination of the present war must always be 
the first Allied aim, and will probably result in diminished tension 
throughout the world, the future position of the United States m.ust 
in no way be jeopardized by any disintegration of our main fighting 
fleet. Fourth, the conception that the present main military role 
of the United States naval force lies in its safeguarding the line of 
communications of the Allies. In pursuing this aim there will be 
generally speaking two classes of vessels engaged: minor craft and 
major craft, and two roles of action, first, offensive and, second 
defensive. Fifth, in pursuing the role set forth in paragraph four, 
the Department cannot too strongly insist on its opinion that the 
offensive must always be the dominant note in any general plans of 
strategy prepared. But as the primary role in all offensive prep- 
arations must perforce belong to the Allied powers, the Navy 
Department announces as its policy that in general it is willing to 
accept any joint plan of action of the Allies deemed necessary to 
meet immediate need. Sixth, pursuant to the above general 
policy, the Navy Department announces as its general plan of action 
the following: One, its willingness to send its minor fighting 
forces, composed of destroyers, cruisers, submarine chasers, aux- 



392 APPENDIX 

iliaries in any number not incompatible with home needs, and to 
any field of action deemed expedient by the joint Allied Admiralties 
which would not involve a violation of our present state policy. 
Two, its unwillingness as a matter of policy to separate any division 
from the main fleet for service abroad, although it is willing to 
send the entire battleship fleet abroad to act as a united but co- 
operating unit when, after joint consultations of all Admiralties 
concerned, the emergency is deemed to warrant it and the extra 
tension imposed upon the line of communications due to the 
increase of fighting ships in European waters will stand the strain 
imposed upon it. Three, its willingness to discuss more fully plans 
for joint operations. End of Quote 1 1 009 (Sd) 

JosEPHUs Daniels. 

APPENDIX VII 

COMMENTS UPON NAVY DEPARTMENT'S POLICY 

Office Vice-Admiral, Commanding 

U. S. Destroyer Forces 

European Waters. 
LONDON, July 16, 1917. 
From: Vice-Admiral Sims 
To: Secretary of the Navy. 

Subject: Concerning Policy of U. S. Naval cooperation in war, 
and allied subjects. 

1. The Department's cablegram of July 10, 1917, quoting a 
letter which had been addressed to the Secretary of State concern- 
ing naval policy in relation to the present war, was received on 
July loth. 

In view of the nature of certain parts of the policy set forth 
therein, I wish to indicate the general policy which has heretofore 
governed my recommendation. 

2. I have assumed that our mission was to promote the 
maximum cooperation with the Allies in defeating a common 
enemy. 

All of my despatches and recommendations have been based on 
the firm conviction that the above mission could and would be 
accomplished, and that hence such questions as the possibility of 
post war situations, or of all or part of the Allies being defeated and 



APPENDIX 393 

America being left alone, were not given consideration — in fact, I 
cannot see how we could enter into this war wholeheartedly if such 
considerations were allowed to diminish in any way the chances of 
Allied success. 

3. The first course open to us which naturally occurs to mind is 
that we should look upon our service as part of the combined 
Allied service, of which the British Grand Fleet is the main body, 
and all other Allied naval forces disposed throughout the world, as 
necessary branches thereof. 

This conception views our battleship fleet as a support or reserve 
of the Allied main body (the British Grand Fleet) and would lead to 
utilizing our other forces to fill in weak spots and to strengthen 
Allied lines, both offensively and defensively, wherever necessary. 

Such a course might be considered as a disintegration of our fleet, 
and it is only natural, therefore, that hesitation and caution should 
be felt in its adoption. 

4. I have felt, however, that it was possible to accomplish our 
mission without in any way involving the so-called disintegration 
of our fleet as a whole. 

In the first instance I have assumed that our aim would be to 
project, or prepare to project, our maximum force against the 
enemy ofi'ensively. 

5. An estimate of the situation shows clearly that the enemy 
is depending for success upon breaking down the Allies' lines of 
communications by virtue of the submarine campaign. 

A necessary part of such a plan is to divert strength from the 
main fleet and from anti-submarine operations by such means as 
coastal raids, threats of landing operations, air raids, and attacks on 
hospital ships, which last necessitates destroyer escort for such 
vessels. 

The submarine campaign itself, while it is of necessity concen- 
trated primarily on the most vital lines of communications, is 
nevertheless carried out in such a manner as to lead the Allies to 
disperse, and not concentrate, their inadequate anti-submarine 
Forces. 

The Allies are, of course, forced to contemplate at all times, and 
hence provide against, the possibility of another main fleet action. 

6. A study of the submarine situation, the number of submarines 
available to the enemy, and the necessary lines of the Allies' 



394 APPENDIX 

communications, for both Army and Navy as well as civil needs, 
shows clearly that the enemy must direct his main effort in certain 
restricted areas. 

These areas, as has repeatedly been reported, are included 
approximately in a circle drawn from about Ushant to the north of 
Scotland. The most effective field for enemy activity is, of course, 
close into the Irish Sea and Channel approaches, where all lines 
must focus. 

But, as stated above, the enemy also attacks occasionally well 
out to sea and in other dispersed areas with a view of scattering the 
limited anti-submarine forces available. 

It therefore seems manifest that the war not only is, but must 
remain, in European waters, in so far as success or failure is 
concerned. 

7. Speaking generally, but disregarding for the moment the 
question of logistics, our course of action, in order to throw our 
main strength against the enemy, would be to move all our forces, 
including the battleship fleet, into the war area. 

8. In view of the nature of the present sea warfare as effected by 
the submarine, such a movement by the battleships would ne- 
cessitate a large force of light craft — much larger than our peace 
establishment provided. In addition to all destroyers, adequate 
protection of the fleet would require all other available light craft 
in the service, or which could be commandeered and put into 
service — that is, submarines, armed tugs, trawlers, yachts, torpedo 
boats, revenue cutters, mine-layers and mine-sweepers, and in fact 
any type of small craft which could be used as protective or 
offensive screens. 

9. In view of the shipping situation, as affected by the submarine 
campaign, it has been impossible to date to see in what way our 
battleships could be supplied in case they were sent into the war 
area. This refers particularly to oil-burning vessels. It would 
therefore seem unwise to recommend such a movement until we 
could see clearly far enough ahead to ensure the safety of the 
lines ot communication which such a force would require. 

10. It is to be observed, however, that even in case the decision 
were made to move the battleships into the war area, it would un- 
avoidably be greatly delayed both in getting together the necessary 
screening forces and also in getting such craft across the Atlantic. 



APPENDIX 395 

In the meantime, and while awaiting a decision as to the move- 
ments of the battleship fleet, the submarine campaign has become 
so intensive, and the available anti-submarine craft have been so 
inadequate to meet it, that the necessity for increasing the anti- 
submarine forces in the war area to the maximum possible extent 
has become imperative. 

1 1 . As long, therefore, as the enemy fleet is contained by the 
stronger British fleet in a position of readiness, it would not 
seem a disintegration of our fleet to advance into the war area all 
the light craft of every description which would necessarily have to 
accompany the fleet in case it should be needed in this area. 

Such movements of the light craft would not in any way separate 
them strategically from the battleships, as they would be operating 
between the enemy and our o>vn main body and based in a position 
to fall back as the main body approached, or to meet it at an 
appointed place. This advance of light forces, strategically, 
would mean no delay whatever to our heavy forces, should the 
time come for their entry into the active war zone. 

12. Another very important consideration is the fact that, 
pending the movement of the battleships themselves, all of the 
light forces would be gaining valuable war experience and would be 
the better prepared for operations of any nature in the future, 
either in connection with the fleet itself or independently. 

It is also considered that it would not constitute a disintegration 
of our fleet to advance into the war zone, in cooperation with the 
British Grand Fleet or for other duty, certain units of our battle- 
ship fleet. These would merely constitute units advanced for 
purpose of enemy defeat, and which would always be in a position 
to fall back on the main part of our Fleet, or to join it as it ap- 
proached the war zone. 

It is for this reason that I recommended, on July 7, 191 7, that 
all coal-burning dreadnaughts be kept in readiness for distant 
service in case their juncture with the Grand Fleet might be 
deemed advisable in connection with unexpected enemy develop- 
ments. 

It would, of course, be preferable to advance the entire fleet 
providing adequate lines of communications could be established 
to ensure their efficient operation. At the present time there is 
a sufficient coal supply in England to supply our coal-burning 



396 APPENDIX 

dreadnaughts, but the oil would be a very diificult problem as it 
must be brought in through the submarine zone. 

When notified that the Chester, Birmingham, and Salem were 
available for duty in the war area, 1 recommended, after consulta- 
tion with the Admiralty, that they join the British Light Cruiser 
Squadrons in the North Sea, where there is always a constant de- 
mand for more ships, especially to oppose enemy raiding and other 
operations aimed at dispersing the Allied sea forces. 

In view of the Department's reference to the Gibraltar situation, 
and also in consideration of the sea-keeping qualities of the seven 
gunboats of the Sacramento class, it was recommended that they 
be based on Gibraltar for duty in assisting to escort convoys clear 
of the Straits, and particularly as this would release some British 
destroyers which are urgently needed in critical areas to the north- 
ward, 

13. The Department's policy, as contained in its letter to the 
Secretary of State, refers in the first statement to an adequate 
defense of our own home waters. It would seem to be sound rea- 
soning that the most effective defence which can be afforded to our 
home waters is an offensive campaign against the enemy which 
threatens those waters. Or in other words, that the place for 
protection of home waters is the place in which protection is 
necessary — that is, where the enemy is operating and must con- 
tinue to operate in force. 

As has been stated in numerous despatches, it is considered that 
home waters are threatened solely in the submarine zone — in fact 
are being attacked solely in that zone, and must continue to be 
attacked therein if the enemy is to succeed against us as well as 
against the European Entente. 

The number of available enemy submarines is not unlimited, and 
the difficulties of obtaining and maintaining bases are fully as 
difficult for submarine as for surface craft. 

The difficulties experienced by enemy submarines en route and in 
operating as far from their bases as they now do are prodigious. 

Operations on our coast without a base are impracticable, except 
by very limited numbers for brief periods, purely as diversions. 

In view of our distance from enemy home bases, the extent of our 
coastline, and the distances between our principal ports, it is a 
safe assumption that if we could induce the enemy to shift the 



APPENDIX 397 

submarine war area to our coasts his defeat would be assured, and 
his present success would be diminished more than in proportion to 
the number of submarines he diverted from the more accessible 
area where commerce necessarily focuses. 

14. The Department's policy refers to willingness to extend 
hearty cooperation to the Allies, and to discuss plans for joint 
operations, and also to its readiness to consider any plans which 
may be submitted by the joint Allied Admiralties. 

15. I submit that it is impossible to carry out this cooperation, to 
discuss plans with the various Admiralties, except in one way — and 
that is, to establish what might be termed an advance headquarters 
in the war zone composed of Department representatives upon 
whose recommendations the Department can depend. 

I refer to exactly the same procedure as is now carried out in 
the army — that is, the General Headquarters in the field being the 
advance headquarters of the War Department at home, and the 
advance headquarters must of necessity be left a certain area of 
discretion and freedom of action as concerns the details of the 
measures necessitated by the military situations as they arise. 

16. The time element is one of the most vital of all elements 
which enter into military warfare, and hence delays in communica- 
tions by written reports, together with the necessity for secrecy, 
render it very diificult to discuss plans at long range. The enemy 
secret service has proved itself to be of extraordinary efficiency. 

Moreover, I believe it to be very unsafe to depend upon dis- 
cussion of military plans by cable, as well as by letter. The 
necessary inadequacy of written or cable communications needs no 
discussion. The opportunities for misunderstandings are great. 
It is difficult to be sure that one has expressed clearly one's mean- 
ing in writing, and hence phrases in a letter are very liable to 
misinterpretation. They cannot explain themselves. 

17. One of the greatest military difficulties of this war, and 
perhaps of all Allied wars, has been the difficulty of coordination 
and cooperation in military effort. I am aware of a great mass of 
information in this connection which it is practically impossible to 
impart except by personal discussion. 

it is unquestionable that efficiency would be greatly improved if 
any one of the Allies — Italy, France, England, or the United 
States, were selected to direct all operations, the others merely 



398 APPENDIX 

keeping the one selected fully informed of their resources available, 
and submitting to complete control and direction in regard to the 
utilization of these resources. 

1 8. If the above considerations are granted, it then becomes 
necessary to decide as to the best location in which to establish such 
advanced headquarters, or what might be called an advance 
branch war council at the front — that is, an advanced branch upon 
whose advice and decisions the War Council itself largely depends. 

1 fully realize the pressure and the influences which must have 
been brought to bear upon the Department from all of the Allies, 
and from various and perhaps conflicting sources. 

I also realize that my position here in England renders me open 
to suspicion that I may be unduly influenced by the British view- 
point of the war. It should be unnecessary to state that I have 
done everything within my ability to maintain a broad viewpoint 
with the above stated mission constantly in mind. 

19. From the naval point of view it would seem evident that 
London is the best and most central location in the war area for 
what I have termed above the Advance Branch of our Naval War 
Council. 

The British navy, on account of its size alone, is bearing the 
brunt of the naval war, and hence all naval information concerning 
the war therefore reaches and centres in London. 

It will be quite possible for all of our advanced headquarter' s' 
staff, or parts or divisions thereof, to visit Paris and other Allied 
Admiralties at any time. 

I wish to make it quite clear that up to date it has been wholly 
impossible for me, with one military Aide, to perform all of the 
functions of such an advanced branch of the Department. 

As stated in my despatches, it has been evident for some time 
that 1 have been approaching a state in which it would be 
physically impossible to handle the work without an increase of 
staff. 

The present state of affairs is such that it is quite within range of 
possibility for serious errors to occur which may involve disaster to 
our ships, due to the physical impossibility of handling the ad- 
ministrative and other work with the thoroughness which is 
essential to safety. 

20. I consider that a very minimum staff which would be re- 



APPENDIX 399 

quired is approximately as follows. More officers could be well 

employed with resulting increase of efficiency: 

(i) One Chief of Staff, who should be free to carry on a con- 
tinuous estimate of the situation, based upon all necessary 
information. He would be given the freedom of the Opera- 
tions Department of the British and French Admiralties. 

(2) An officer, preferably of the rank of commander, for duties 
in connection with shipping and convoy to handle all the 
numerous communications in relation to the movements of 
American shipping, particularly military shipping, and also 
other shipping carrying American troops. 

(3) An officer, at least a lieutenant-commander, for duties in 
connection with Anti-Submarine Division operations in 
orderto insure perfect cooperation in that field of work be- 
tween our service and other Allied Services. 

(4) An officer of all-around ability and discretion for duties in 
connection with general military intelligence. He should be 
in constant touch with the Secret Service Departments of 
the Admiralties to insure that all military intelligence, 
which in any way effects the Navy Department or our 
Forces, is properly and promptly acted upon. 

(5) At least two lieutenants or lieutenant-commanders of the 
line in my own office in connection with general administra- 
tive questions in additions to the one now available. The 
necessity for these additional officers is imperative. 

(6) One communication officer to take general charge of codes 
and communications both with the Department at home, 
the Allied Admiralties, and with the various bases of our 
Forces in the war area. (At present Queenstown, Brest, 
Bordeaux, St. Nazaire, London, and Paris.) 

(7) A paymaster to have complete charge of all financial matters 
connected with our naval organization abroad. This 
officer should be in addition to Paymaster Tobey who is 
performing necessary and invaluable service on my staff in 
connection with all logistic questions. 

(Signed) Wm. S. Sims. 



400 



APPENDIX 
APPENDIX VIII 



MONTHLY LOSSES SINCE FEBRUARY, 1917, FROM 
ENEMY ACTION 

During the twenty-one months of unrestricted submarine war- 
fare from February, 19 17, to October, 191 8, inclusive, 3,843 mer- 
chant vessels (British fishing vessels included) of a total gross 
tonnage of 8,378,947 have been sunk by enemy action, a monthly 
average of 183 vessels totalling 398,997 gross tons. The Octo- 
ber tonnage losses show a decrease from this average of 286,570 
gross tons, or 71.8 per cent. 

The following gives the tonnage losses by months from February, 
191 7, to October, 1918, inclusive: 





BRITISH 


OTHER 


NEUTRAL 


BRITISH 




PERIOD 


MERCHANT 




MERCHANT 


FISHING 


TOTAL 




VESSELS 


VESSELS 


VESSELS 


VESSELS 




igi7 












February . 


313486 


84,820 


135.090 


3.478 


536,334 


March . . 


353478 


81,151 


165,225 


3,586 


603,440 


April 


545,282 


134,448 


189,373 


5.920 


875.023 


May . . 


352,289 


102,960 


137.957 


1,448 


594,654 


June 


417,925 


126,171 


139.229 


1.342 


684,667 


July. . . 


364,858 


111,683 


70,370 


2,736 


549.647 


August . 


329,810 


1 28,489 


53.018 


242 


511.559 


September . 


196,212 


119,086 


29,941 


245 


345.484 


October. . 


276,132 


127,932 


54.432 


227 


458,723 


November . 


173,560 


87,646 


31.476 


87 


292,769 


December . 


253.087 


86,981 


54.047 


413 


394,528 





BRITISH 


OTHER 


NEUTRAL 


BRITISH 




PERIOD 


MERCHANT 


ALLltU 


MERCHANT 


FISHING 


TOTAL 




VESSELS 


VESSELS 


VESSELS 


VESSELS 




I918 












January 


179.973 


87,078 


35.037 


375 


302,463 


February . 


226,896 


54.904 


36,374 


686 


318,860 


March . . 


199.458 


94,321 


51.035 


293 


345.107 


April 


215.453 


50,879 


11,361 


241 


277.934 


May . . 


192,436 


80,826 


20,757 


504 


294.523 


June . . 


162,990 


51.173 


38,474 


639 


253.276 


July. . . 


165,449 


70,900 


23.552 


555 


260,456 


August . 


145,721 


91,209 


41,946 


1.455 


280,331 


September . 


136,864 


39.343 


10,393 


142 


186,742 


October. . 


57,607 


41,308 


13,512 




112,427 



APPENDIX 
APPENDIX IX 



401 



TONNAGE CONSTRUCTED BY ALLIED AND 
NEUTRAL NATIONS SINCE AUGUST, 1914 

Construction of merchant shipping is shown in the following 
table, which gives tonnage completed since the beginning of the 
war for the United Kingdom, United States, and for other Allied 
and Neutral Nations. 



1914. . . . 

1915. . . . 
1916. 

1917- • • • 

1918 I St quarter 
2nd " 
3rd " 
October . 

1918 (10 months) 

'Estimated. 



UNITED 

KINGDOM 

GROSS TONS 



675,610 

650,919 

541,552 

1.163,474 



320,280 
442,966 
411,395 
136,100 

1,310,741 



UNITED 

STATES 

GROSS TONS 



1 20,000* 
225,122 

325,413 
1 ,034,296 



328,541 
558,939 
834,250 
357,532* 

2,080,262 



OTHER 
ALLIED AND 

NEUTRAL 
GROSS TONS 



217,310 

325,959 
821,036 

505,585 



220,496 

240,369 

232,127 

50,000 

742,992 



WORLD TOTAL 
GROSS TONS 



1,012,920 
1,202,000 

1,688,000 
2,703,355 



870,317 
1,242,274 
1,477,772 

543,632 

4,133,995 



INDEX 



INDEX 



Aboukir, Hague and Cressy torpedoed by 
U-29, 101, 205 

Achates, with convoy, 146 

Active, flagship of Vice-Admiral Bayly, 71 

Adams, Ensign Ashley D., in charge of sub- 
chaser units, 224 

Aircraft against submarines, 320 

Alcock, goes to relief of sinking mystery ship 
Dunraven, 194 

Allied Naval Council, value of, 256 

Amberger, Kapitan-Leutnant Gustav, of U-58, 
captured with crew by Fanning and Nichol: 
son, 157; comment as to treatment in letter 
to friend, 160 

American forces in European waters, strength 
of, 240 

Anti-submarine craft, use of, 35 

Anti-submarine devices, search for, 1 1 

Arkansas, on duty with the Grand Fleet, 352 

Arming of merchant vessels, 33 

Aroostook, mine-layer, 297, 309 

Aubrietia, mystery ship, heading convoy, 
142; sights submarine, 146 

Audacious, simk by mine laid by submarine, 
205 

Aviation, Naval, development of, 327; num- 
ber of planes and extent of material and 
personnel at time of armistice, 333 

Babcock, Commander, J. V. sails with Ad- 
miral Sims as aide, 4; at London head- 
quarters, 240, 249, 252 

Badger in bombardment of Durazzo, 235 

Bagley, Lieut. -Commander D. W., highly 
commended, 166 

Baillargeon, J. C, volunteers services at 
London headquarters, 243 

Baldwin Locomotive Works, constructors of 
the U. S. mobile railway batteries sent to 
Western Front, 337 

Balfour, Arthur James, discussion of sub- 
marine situation with, 12; with Commis- 
sion to the United States, 13, 14; advises 
Washington of critical submarine situation, 
49 

Baltimore, converted as mine-layer, 295, 305, 
309 

Basilisk, assisted by yacht Lydonia, sinks 
submarine, 163 

Bassett, Capt. F. B., commanding the Utah, 
354 

Bastedo, Lieut. -Commander Paul H., in 
bombardment of Durazzo, 234, 236 

Bayly, Vice Admiral Lewis, letter of welcome 
to Commander Taussig, 55; cordial welcome 
to Americans at Queenstown, 57; instructs 
Americans as to duties in submarine zone, 
60; personal characteristics, 64; meets 
Fanning and congratulates officers and men 
on capture of submarine crew, 159; message 
commending American forces at Queens- 
town, 167; introduces Captain Gordon 
Campbell of the "mystery ship," 169; has 
difficulty in identifying one such ship, 179 



Beach, Capt, E. L., with the Grand Fleet, 

352 
Beatty, Admiral Sir David, attitude toward 

torpedo flags, 255; farewell speech to 

American Sixth Battle Squadron, 353 
Belknap, Capt. Reginald R., commanding 

mine laying squadron, 295, 304, 309 
Benham, highly commended, 166 
Berrien, Commander Frank D., commanding 

destroyer division, 154; highly commended, 

166 
"Big Bertha," American naval guns sent to 

destroy, 337 
Billings, A. W. K., great work in connection 

with air service, 331 
Birmingham, at Gibraltar, 160 
Blakely, Lieut.-Commander C. A., highly 

commended, 166 
Blakeslee, Lieut.-Commander E. G., at Lon- 
don headquarters, 250 
Blue, Capt. Victor, with the Grand Fleet, 352 
Boyd, Capt. David F., good work in convoying 

subchasers, 210 
Brest, as destroyed base, 160, 349 
Brindisi, rendezvous for, attack on Durazzo, 

234 
Briscoe, Lieut.-Commander Benjamin, good 

work in construction of air service stations, 

331 
Bristol, Capt. M. L., commanding the 

Oklahofna, 354 
British, place all sources of information at 

our disposal, 11 
British Admiralty, commends work of U. S. 

aviation pilots, 332 
British Fleet, not in, control of the seas, 21; 

at Scapa Flow, 36 
Broke, sinks two German destroyers, 74 
Browne, Ralph C, perfects new type of 

submarine mine, 292 
Bruges, submarine base, 25 
Bullard, Capt. W. H. G., with the Grand 

Fleet, 352 
Bumstead, Prof. H. A., at London headquar- 
ters, 250 
Bunker Hill, converted as mine-layer, 297 
Bushnell, David, inventor submarine, 264 
Butler, Capt. H. V., with mine-laying squad- 
ron, 309 

Callan, Lieut-Commander J. L., in charge 

of U. S. air forces in Italy, 330 
Campbell, Capt. Gordon, at Queenstown, 
71; exploits with mystery ships, 169; with 
"mystery ship" Pargust, 175; technique 
of operation, 176; heroism on Dunraven, 
186; letter from Admiral Sims on Dunraven 
exploit, 194 
Canandaigua, mine-layer, 297, 304, 309 
Canonicus, mine-layer, 297, 304, 309 
Carpender, Lieut. A. S., in command of 
Fanning when submarine crew was cap- 
tured, 158; receives D. S. O., 160 
Carson, Sir Edward, discussion of submarine 
with, 12; discussion of convoy system, 114 



40S 



4o6 



INDEX 



Cecil, Lord Robert, discussion of submarine 
situation with, 12 

Centurion; in China, commanded by Jellicoe, 54 

Christabel, decisive encounter with sub- 
marine, 152 

Chnstopher, goes to relief of sinking mystery 
ship Dunraven, 194 

Christy, Capt. H. H., with the Grand Fleet, 
352 

Churchill Winston, "digging the rats out of 
their holes," 288 

Clinton-Baker, Rear-Admiral, in command of 
British mine-laying operations, 301 

Cluverius, Capt. W. T., with mine-laying 
squadron, 309 

Cole, Capt. W. C, commanding the Nevada, 
354 

College boys and subchasers, 198 

Commerce raiders, guarding against, 113. 134 

Cone, Capt. Hutch I., at London head- 
quarters, 250, 252; organizer American 
foreign service air forces, 330; severely 
injured on torjjedoed Leinster, 331 

Conner, Francis G., jumps overboard from 
Fanning to save drowning German from 
crew of submarine, 158 

Convoy of Shipping to Scandinavia, 29 

Convoy system, ancient use of, 103; merchant 
captains hostile to, 105, 111; the successful 
Gibraltar experiment, 114; merchant cap- 
tains won over, 115; the headquarters, and 
officers in charge, 122; details of operation, 
123, 129; routing of the convoys, 131. 139; 
actual convoys described, 141; success of 
system and small percentage of loss, 163; 
relative parts taken by Great Britain and 
the United States, 165; most important 
agency in wiiming the war, 168 

Conyngham, in first American destroyer 
contingent, 52; with convoy, 146, 148; 
destroys submarine, 150, 151 

Copeland, D. G., great work in connection 
with air service, 331 

Corfu, subchaser base established at, 214; 
detachment performing excellent service, 
228 

Cork, American destroyer officers make 
state visit to, 59; sailors not jiermitted to 
visit, 86 

Gotten, Capt. Lyman A., commanding first 
squadron of subchasers to arrive at Ply- 
mouth, 209; work in training subchaser 
crews, 210; commanding subchaser squad- 
rons at Plymouth, 215 

Craven, Capt, T. T., great service in aviation, 
329 

Crenshaw, Captain Arthur, good work in 
convoying subchasers, 210 

Cressy, Aboukir, and Home torpedoed by 
U-29, 101. 205 

Cronan, Capt. William P., work in training 
subchaser crews, 210 

Cumberland, escorting convoy, 144, 147 

Cunningham, Major A. A., commanding 
Marine Corps aviation in Northern Bomb- 
ing Group, 331 

Cushing, at Queenstown, 166; deceived by 
"mystery ship," 175 

Danae, attempt to torpedo, 152 

Daniels, Secretary of War, instructs Admiral 

Sims to sail for England, 3 
Dartmouth, in attack on Durazzo, 234 
Davis, in first American destroyer contingent, 

52 
Davison, Trubee, organizer Yale aviation unit, 

recommended for Distinguished Service 

Medal, 328 



De Bon, Vice- Admiral Chief of French Naval 
Staff, 259 

De Steigner, Capt. L. R., with the Grand 
Fleet, 352 

Decatur, at Gibraltar, 162 

Defrees, Captain Joseph H., work in perfec- 
tion of listening devices, 210 

Delaware, on duty with Grand Fleet, 352 

Depth charge, ongin of, 94; effects of on sub- 
marines, 95 

Destroyers, scarcity of in British navy, 37 
a new type of war vessel, their history, 90 
size and armament, 91; high efficiency, 92 
how submarines are attacked, 98; use of in 
convoying merchant vessels, 113 

Destroyers, American, arrive in Queenstown, 
50; copy of sailing orders, 53; compared 
with British, 60; why plac«i under British 
Admiral at Queenstown, 75; number of at 
Queenstown, 76; enthusiasm of British 
public on arrival, 77; "the return of the 
Mayflower" 78; in action, 118; duties of, 
121; 

Deutschland, "merchant" submarine visits 
Newport News, 310 

Di Revel, Vice-Admiral, Italian Member 
Allied Naval Council, 261 

Dortch, Lieut.-Commander I. F., highly 
commended, 166 

Drayton, highly commended, 166 

Duff, Vice- Admiral Sir Alexander L., in charge 
of convoy system, 123 

Duncan, Aineric£in destroyer at Queenstown, 
70 

Dunlap, Col. R. H., at London headquarters, 
253 

Dunraven, mystery ship, heroism of captain 
and crew, 186; given Victoria Cross, 193, 
194 

Durazzo, bombardment of, 233 

Earle, Rear-Admiral in charge of design of 
mobile railway batteries for Western Front, 
337 

Edwards, Lieut.-Commander W. A., at 
London headquarters, 250, 252; commands 
Yale aviation imit, 329; succeeds Captain 
Cone in charge of aviation section, 332 

Evans, Capt. F. T., in command of U. S. 
aviation centre at Pauillac, France, 331 

Evans, Capt. E. R. G. R., British liaison 
officer with American destroyers, 54; ex- 
ploit as commander of destroyer Broke, 74 

Fairfield, Commander Arthur P., with first 
American destroyer contingent, 52; highly 
commended, 166 

Fanning, captures crew of submarine, 155 
Farquhar, Lieut.-Commander, highly com- 
mended, 166 

Fenian Ram, Holland's submarine, 267 

Fighting submarines from the air, 320 

Fisher, Admiral Sir John, in charge of de- 
p>artment for investigating anti-submarine 
devices, 11; tells of American built sub- 
marines, first to cross Atlantic, 311 

Fletcher, Rear-Admiral Wm. B., commanding 
Brest naval base, 349 

Florida, on duty with Grand Fleet, 352 

Foster, Arnold, on building of submarines, 
267 

Fullinwider, Commander S. P., efforts in 
perfection of new submarine mine, 292 

Fulton, Robert, efforts in developing the sub- 
marine, 265 

Funakoshi, Rear-Admiral, Japanese member 
Allied Naval Council, 261 



INDEX 



467 



Furer, Commander Julius A., work in de- 
velopment of subchasers, 206 

Gannon, Capt. Sinclair, with mine-laying 
squadron, 309 

Gates, Lieut.-Commander A. L., exploits, at 
Dunkirk, 335 

Geddes, Sir Eric, First Lord of the Admiralty, 
258 

George, King, meeting with, 14; popular with 
American sailors, 81 

George, Lloyd, optimistic regarding sub- 
marine situation, 15; in discussion of con- 
voy system, 114 

German interned ships converted into trans- 
ports, 350 

Gibraltar, cooperation of American navy with 
British in operations at, 160, 161 

Gillmor, R. E., volunteers services at London 
headquarters, 242 

Gleaves, Rear-Admiral Albert, creates organ- 
ization for administering transport fleet, 
350 

Glinder, Franz, drowned from submarine 
when crew surrendered to Fanning, 158; 
buried with honors of war, 160 

Good, P. F., volunteers services at London 
headquarters, 242 

Goschen, Viscount, deemed submarine use- 
less, 267 

Graham, Capt. S. V., good work in convoying 
subchasers, 210 

Grand Fleet, British, protected by destroyers, 
88; immune from torpedo attack, 102 

Greenslade, Capt. J. W., with mine-laying 
squadron, 309 

Harrunon, Ensign C. H., exploit at Pola, 334 

Hanrahan, Commander David C, highly 
commended, 166; commanding American 
mystery ship, Santee, 196; in command of 
Northern Bombing Group, 331 

Harwell, Elxer, jumps overboard from Fan- 
ning to save drowning German from crew 
of submarine, 158 

Helfferich, Dr. Karl, on effectiveness of the 
submarine, 19 

Henry, Lieut. Walter S., on Fanning, 155 

Hepburn, Capt. Arthur J., work in training 
subchaser crews, 210; commanding squad- 
ron of subchasers, reaches Queenstown, 
238 

Hague, Cressy and Aboukir, torpedoed by 
U-29, 101, 205 

Holland, John P., designer of the modern 
submarine, 267 

Hope, Rear-Admiral, receives Admiral Sims 
on arrival, 4 

Hospital ships, torpedoing of, 38 

Housalonic, mine-layer, 297, 304, 309 

Howard, Lieut.-Commander D. L., highly 
commended, 166 

Hughes, Capt. C. F. with the Grand Fleet, 
352 

Inventions, anti-submarine, search for, 11 
Inverness and Invergordon, mine-assembly 

bases at, 300 
Ives, Ensign Paul F., drops a "dud" on deck 

of submarine, 332 

Jacob Jones, torjDedoed by U-53, 128; highly 

commended, 166 
Jacoby, Ensign Sinclair, at bombardment of 

Durazzo, 236 
Jellicoe, Admiral, character and abilities, 7; 

statement of tonnage lost to submarines, 

9; in conference with, 11; wounded in 



Boxer Rebellion, 54; letter of welcome to 
Commander Taussig, 55; difficulty in 
having convoy system adopted, 106, 114; 
presides over Allied Naval Council, 257 

Jessop, Captain E. P., good work in convoy- 
ing subchasers, 210 

Johnson, Commander, Alfred W., with first 
American destroyer contingent, 52 

Johnson, Capt. T. L., with mine-laying 
squadron, 309 

Justicia, torpedoing of, 136, 137; torpedoing 
announced as that of Leviathan by German 
Admiralty, 365 

Kelly, Commodore, in bombardment of 
Durazzo, 234; congratulates subchasers in 
this action, 238. 

Kennedy, Ensign S. C, makes record sea- 
plane flight, 324 

Keyes, Ensign K. B., extracts from seaplane 
flight report, 324 

Keys, Admiral Sir Roger, reconstructs sub- 
marine barrage, 26 

Killingholme, England, U. S. air station at, 
323,330 

Kittredge, T. B., volunteers service at Lon- 
don headquarters, 242 

Knox, Capt. D. W. at London headquarters, 
253 

KronpTinzessin Cecilie, converted into trans- 
port, 351 

Lacase, Admiral French Minister of Marine. 
259 

Leigh, Capt. Richard H., experiments with 
listening devices, 203; sent to Italy to con- 
struct subchaser base, 214; at London head- 
quarters, 250, 252 

Libbey, Commander Miles A., work in per- 
fection of listening devices, 210 

Listening devices, development of, 202 
esp)ecially advantageous on subchaser, 210 
method of operation on subchasers, 216 
of great value in the Otranto barrage, 230 
tube climbed by submarine survivor, 231 

Little, Col. L. McC, at London headquarters, 
250 

London headquarters, 240, 247; different 
departments of, 249; work of the Planning 
Section, 253 

Long, Capt. A. T. commanding the Nevada, 
354 

Long, Capt. Byron A., at headquarters of 
convoy system, 123; at London head- 
quarters, 250, 251; routing American troops 
to France, 348 

Loomis, Coxswain David D., lookout on 
Fanning when submarine crew was cap- 
tured, 155 

Lord Mayor of Cork, welcomes Americans at 
Queenstown, 56 

Lowestoft, in attack on Durazzo, 234 

Luckenback, shelled by submarine, 148 

Ludlow, Ensign G. H., wounded, rescued 
from water by comrade in another seaplane, 
334 

Lydonia, assists in sinking submarine, 163 

Lyons, Lieut.-Commander D., highly com- 
mended, 166 

MacDonnell, Lieut.-Commander E. O., in 
charge of flying Caproni bombers from Italy 
to Flanders, 331 

MacDougall, Capt. W. D. at London head- 
quarters, 241 

McBride, Capt. L. B., at London headquar- 
ters, 250, 251 



408 



INDEX 



McCalla, Captain, meets Admiral Jellicoe in 
China, 54 

McCormick, E. H., volvmteers services at 
London headquarters, 242 

McCullougli, Commander Richard P., recom- 
mended for decoration for part in sinking 
submarine, 163 

McDougal, in first American destroyer con- 
tingent, 52; highly commended, 166 

McDowell, Commander Clyde S., work in 
perfection of listening devices, 210 

McGrann, Commander W. H., at London 
headquarters, 250 

McNamee, Capt. L., at London headquarters, 
253 

McVay, Capt. C. B., commanding the Okla- 
homa, 354 

Magruder, Rear-Admiral T. P., good work in 
convoying subchasers, 210 

Mannix, Commander D. Pratt, with mine- 
laying squadron, 309 

Marshall, Capt. A. W., with mine-laying 
squadron, 309 

Mary Rose, welcomes American destroyers at 
Queenstown, 51 

Massachusetts, converted as mine-layer, 297 

Melville, "Mother Ship" of the destroyers 
at Queenstown, 70, 76 

Millard, H., volunteers services at London 
headquarters, 243 

Milner, Lord, in discussion of convoy system, 
114 

Mine barrage, at first not effective against 
submarines, 26,32 

Mine barrage in North Sea, American, 285; 
immensity of, 294; how laid, 301 

Mine laying by German submarines, 62, 318, 
319 

Mines, Americans perfect new type, 292; 
immense organization of supply and trans- 
port, 295 

Moewe, commerce raider, 1 13 

Murfin, Capt. Orin G., designer and builder 
of mine-assembly bases in Scotland, 300 

Mystery ships, greatly aid in combatting the 
submarine, 122; accompanying convoy, 
142; method of operating, 142; operations 
of, 169; technique, 176; difficulty of iden- 
tifying, 179; number in operation 180; heroic 
fight of the Dunraven, 186; exploit of Prize, 
195; AmericEin ship,' Santee 196; Stock- 
force destroys submarine, 216 

Nautilus, submarine of Robert Fulton, 265 

Naval guns, German, bombarding Dunkirk 
and Paris, 337 

Naval guns, U. S., used on the Western Front, 
336 

Nelson, Capt. C. P., good work in convoying 
subchasers, 210; commanding subchaser 
squadrons at Corfu, 228; in bombardment 
of Durazzo, 234, 235 

Neptune attacked by U-29, 101, 102 

Nevada, guarding transports, 354 

New York, on duty with Grand Fleet, 352 

Niblack, Rear-Admiral Albert P., command- 
ing forces at Gibraltar, 161; asks that 
subchasers be sent to Gibraltar, 229 

Nicholson, in submarine chase, 148; on con- 
voy duty, 154; assists Fanning in capture 
of submarine and crew, 156; highly com- 
mended, 166 

Noma, goes to relief of sinking'mystery ship 
Dunraven, 194 

Northern Bombing Group, established, 330, 
331 

O'Brien, highly commended, 166 



Oil, scarcity of for Great Britain's fleet, 43 
Oklahoma, guarding transports, 354 
Orama, torpedoed, 150 

Ostend, bombing of submarine base at, 33 i 
Otranto barrage, the, 214, 229 

Page, Ambassader Walter Hines, asks thai 
high naval representative be sent to Eng- 
land, 3; states that England faces defeat by 
submarines, 11; letter to Secretary of State 
on critical submarine situation, 48; advised 
of submarine peril, 63; a tower of strength, 
243 

Par gust, "mystery ship," destroys submarine, 
175 

Parker, in hunt for submarine, 143; highly 
commended, 166; supporting ship for sub- 
chasers at Plymouth, 215; seriously dam- 
ages the U-53, 222 

Pauillac, France, U. S. aviation centre at, 330 

Pennsylvania, transmits mobilization orders 
to destroyer division, 52 

Pershing, General, requests naval guns be 
landed at St. Nazaire, 337; report of their 
skilful use, 340 

Pescara, Italy, U. S., seaplane station at, 330 

Pisa, in attack on Durazzo, 234 

Pitt, William, early opinion of the submarine, 
265 

Planning Section at London headquarters, 
253 

Pleadwell, Capt. F. L., at London headquar- 
ters, 250 

Plunkett, Admiral Charles P., commanding 
naval guns on Western Front, 336; aids in 
designing mobile railway batteries, 337 

Plymouth, subchaser base at, 215 

Pocahontas, converted from German liner to 
transport, 351 

Porter, in fiirst American destroyer contin- 
gent, 52 

Porto Corsini, Italy, U. S. seaplane station 
at, 330 

Poteet, Lieut.-Commander Fred H., with 
first American destroyer contingent, 52 

Potter, Ensign Stephen, shoots down enemy 
seaplane and in turn is shot down, 335 

Powell, Lieut.-Commander Halsey, of de- 
stroyer Parker, 143; highly commended, 
166 

Princess Irene, converted into transport, 351 

Pringle, Capt. J. R. P., at Queenstown, 71; 
commended by Admiral Bayly, 166 

Prize, mystery ship, damages submarine and 
captures captain and two of crew, 195 

Q-ships, see Mystery ships 

Queenstown, a destroyer base, 41; arrival of 

first American destroyers, 50; officially 

welcomes the Americans, 56 
Quinnebaug, mine-layer, 297, 309 

Rene, in westbound convoy, 155 

Reynolds, Commander, W. H., with mine- 
laying squadron, 309 

Rhein, converted into transport, 351 

Richardson, R. M. D., volunteers services at 
London headquarters, 242 

Roanoke, mine-layer, 297, 304, 309 

Roberts, Lady, requests Admiral Sims to call, 
80 

Robison, Rear-Admiral S. S., work in perfec- 
tion of listening devices, 210 

Rodgers, Rear-Admiral Thomas S., com- 
manding dreadnaught division in Bantry 
Bay, 354 

Rodman, Admiral Hugh, commanding Amer- 
ican squadron with the Grand Fleet, 352 



INDEX 



409 



Rose, Hans, humane commander of the U-53, 
127; Allied forces ambitious to capture, 
222; not on U-53 when depth charged, 224; 
visits Newport, and sinks merchantmen off 
Nantucket, 310 

Royal Family, interested in American sailors, 
81 

SacTamento, at Gibraltar, 160 

San Diego, sunk by mine off Fire Island, 
319 

San Francisco, converted as mine-layer, 295, 
309 

San Giorgio, in attack on Diu-azzo, 234 

San Marco, in attack on Durazzo, 234 

Sanders, Lieut. William, commanding mys- 
tery ship, Prize, 195; awarded Victoria 
Cross, 196 

Santa Maria, compared in size to modern 
destroyer, 91 

Santee, U. S. mystery ship, 179, 196 

Saranac, mine-layer, 297, 309 

Scales, Capt, A. H., with the Grand Fleet, 
352 

Schieffelin, Lieut. John J., recommended for 
Distinguished Service Medal, 322 

Schofield, Capt. Frank H., work in perfection 
of listening devices, 210; at London head- 
quarters, 253 

Schuyler, Commander, G. L., at London 
headquarters, 250 

Schwab, Charles M., fabricates submarines 
for the Allies, 311 

Seaplane base at Killingholme, England, 
taken over by U. S., 323 

Seaplane stations of U. S. forces in Europe, 
330 

Sexton, Capt. W. R., at London headquarters, 
249 

Shawmut, mine-layer, 297, 309 

Sims, Admiral, ordered to England, 3; noti- 
fies Washington that war is being lost, 43 ; 
of the oil scarcity, 44; favors using U. S. 
naval forces in conjunction with Allies, 45; 
first report of critical submarine situation, 
47; extent of duties in European waters 75; 
significance of the Guildhall speech, 79; 
reception accorded by British people 79; 
meets Lady Roberts, 80; first foreign naval 
officer to command British forces in war, 82; 
works for adoption of convoy system. 111, 
114; congratulates officers and men of 
Fanning on capture of submarine and crew, 
160; has difficulty in identifying a "mystery 
ship," 179; letter to Captain Campbell on 
Dunraven exploit, 194; Warns Navy De- 
partment of German submarines visiting 
U. S. coast, 311 

Sinn Fein, controversy with American sailors, 
83; in league with Germany, 87 

Smith, Capt. S. F., at London headquarters, 
250 

Sparrow, Capt. H. G., good work in convoying 
subchasers, 210 

Stark, Commander Harold R., brings small 
destroyers from Manila to Gibraltar, 162; 
at London headquarters, 250 

Steams, Capt. C. D., with mine-laying squad- 
ron, 309 

Sterrett, highly commended, 166 

Stevens. L. S., volunteers services at London 
headquarters, 243 

Stockforce, mystery ship, destroys submarine, 

Stockton, G. B., volunteers services at Lon- 
don headquarters, 242 

Strauss, Rear-Admiral Joseph, in command 
of U. S. Mine-laying operations, 300 



Subchasers, number built and bases used 
198; mobilized at New London, Conn., 
204; great numbers ordered by Great 
Britain and France, 205, 211; hardships of 
the new crews, 207; make 6,000 mile trip, 
from New London to Corfu, 229; an in- 
fluence in the breakdown of Austria, 231; 
in attack on Durazzo, 233; congratulated 
on exploits at Durazzo by British Com- 
modore and Italian Naval General Staff, 
238 

Submarine against submarine, 263; method 
of attack, 273 

Submarine sinkings, gravity of, concealed by 
British, 5, 9; maps showing extent and 
location of, 12, 13; losses of shipping, 63, 
168 

Submarines, American built first to cross 
Atlantic, 311; really submersible surface 
ships 269; how operated, 269; an American 
invention, 264 

Submarines, American, their part in the war, 
263; attacked by destroyers through error, 
276; the base at Berehaven, 279; witnesses 
U-boat destroy itself, 280 

Submarines, British, the H-, E-, and if-boats, 
263; destroy a U-boat, 279 

Submarines, enemy, winning the war, 7, 9; 
number of, destroyed, 10; officers' exagger- 
ate sinkings, 18; difficulty of blockading 
the United States, 22; cruising period 
dependent upon supply of torpedoes, 25; 
mines and nets not effective against, 26; 
Number operating simultaneously, 26, 28, 
40; erroneous impression as to nimibers 
operating, 27; every movement charted 
by Allies, 28, 316, 318; three different 
types of, 30; plans to pen in the bases, 
31; playing hide and seek with de- 
stroyers, 42; on American coast, 45, 310; 
amount of shipping destroyed, 63; how 
attacked by destroyer, 98; method of at- 
tack on battleships, 101; operating on 
American coast impracticable, 109; in- 
dividual locations and movements plotted 
each day, 124; destroyed by depth charges, 
151, 153, 155, 162; decoying by "mystery- 
ship," 169, 216; not taken seriously until 
after Weddingen's exploit, 205; concen- 
trated in enclosed waters, 212; the Otranto 
barrage, 214; sinkings prevented by sub- 
chasers, 216; how located by listening de- 
vices, 216; U-53 seriously damaged by de- 
stroyer Parker, 222; suicide of entire crew of 
a depth charged submarine, 227; two sub- 
marines sunk by subchasers in bombard- 
ment of Durazzo, 237; Germans have dif- 
culty in reaching home after Austrian sur- 
render, 239; number destroyed by Allies 
and how, 263; U-boat destroys itself, 280; 
the cruiser submarines, 281; their various 
bases, 285; effectiveness of American North 
Sea mine barrage, 285; lay mines on Ameri- 
can coast, 318; 319; Aircraft an important 
factor against, 320; number sunk about 
British Isles, 344; forced to choose between 
transports and merchantmen, 356 

Surveyor, yacht, assists in sinking submarine, 
162 

Surveyor, merchantman, torpedoed while being 
convoyed, 162 

Susquehanna, converted from German liner 
to transport, 351 

Swasey, A. Loring, services in designing of 
subchasers, 206 

Taussig, Commander Joseph K., in charge 
of first American destroyer contingent, 52; 



410 



INDEX 



copy of sailing orders, 53; previous record 
54; welcoming letters from Admirals 
Jellicoe and Bayly, 55; reports to Vice- 
Admiral Bayly at Queenstown, 56; highly 
commended, 166 

Taylor, Capt. M. M., with the Grand Fleet, 
352 

Texas, on duty with Grand Fleet, 352 

Thompson, Commander Edgar, at London 
headquarters, 250 

Thomson, Commander T. A., at London 
headquarters, 250 

Tobey, Capt. E. C, at London headquarters, 
250, 252 

Tomb, Capt, J. Harvey, with mine-laying 
squadron, 309 

Tompkins, Capt. John T., work in organiza- 
tion of subchaser fleet, 210 

Torpedo, track or wake made by, 97; effec- 
tive range of, 100; duration of submarine's 
voyage dependent on number carried, 25; 
supply limited, 34; cost of, 93 

Torpedo boat, invention of, 90 

Tozer, Capt. C. M., good work in convoying 
subchasers, 210 

Transporting armies to France, 342; nation- 
ality of ships and percentage carried, 352 

Turtle, first submarine, 264 

Twining, Capt. N. C, at London headquar- 
ters, 249, 250 

U-29, torpedoes Hague, Cressy, and Aboukir 
and is later sunk by Dreadnought, 101 

U-53, operates off American coast, 127; 
torjjedoes the Jacob Jones, 128; seriously 
damaged by depth chEirges, 222; surrend- 
ered after armistice, 224; after visiting 
Newport, R. I., sinks several merchant- 
men, 310 

U-58 depth charged and crew captured by 
Fanning, and Nicholson, 156 

U-151, lays mines off American coast, 318 

U-156, lays mines off American coast, 319 

UC-56, practically destroyed by depth charge 
from Christabel, 154 

Utah, guarding transports, 354 

Vaterland, converted into transport, 351 
Vauclain, Samuel M., great help in turning 

out mobile railway batteries, 338 
Venetia, assists in sinking submarine, 162; 

seriously damages another, 163 



Voysey, Miss, niece of Vice-Admiral Bayly, 
and charming hostess, 71 

Wadsworth, in first American destroyer con- 
tingent, 42; highly commended, 166 

Wainwright, in first American destroyer con- 
tingent, 52 

Washington, Capt. Thomas, with the Grand 
Fleet, 352 

Weatherhead, Ensign C. H., makes record sea- 
plane flight, 324 

Weddingen, Commander Otto, torpedoes 
Hague, Cressy and Aboukir, and is in turn 
sunk by battleship Dreadnought, 101, 205 

Welshman, narrow escape from being tor- 
pedoed, 155, 159 

Weymouth, in attack on Durazzo, 234. 

Wheeling, depth charges submarine, 162 

White, Sir William, on the submarine, 264 

Whiting, Commander Kenneth, great service 
in aviation, 329 

Wiley, Capt. H. A., with the Grand Fleet, 
352 

Wilhelm, Kaiser, on effectiveness of the sub- 
marine, 18 

Wilkes, on submarine hunt with Parker, 222 

Williams, Lieut.-Commander Roger, at 
Queenstown, 70 

Wilson, Rear-Admiral Henry B., commander 
of forces at Gibraltar, 160; at Brest, 161; 
commanding Brest naval base, 349 

Wireless telegraphy, of the submarines and 
destroyers, 120; messages reveal locations 
of submarines, 126 

Wortman, Lieut.-Commander Ward K., with 
first American destroyer contingent, 52 

Wyoming, on duty with Grand Fleet, 352 

Y-Guns, or howitzers, for hurling depth 
charges, 95 

Yachts, good service on French coast, 350 

Yale aviation unit, organization of, 328; 
renders great service, 329 

Yarnell, Capt. H. E., at London headquar- 
ters, 253 

Zeebrugge, bombing of submarine base at, 
331 

Zigzagging, efficacious protection against sub- 
marines, 104, 144 

Zogbaum, Lieut.-Commander Rufus F., with 
first American destroyer contingent, 52 




79 ^i 



IHE CX3UNTRY LIFE PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. Y. 



/>t'''^^'\yu^y\^\ 











■^ 



^^ .-. "V 




-v 









.*'\ 
















V . 4 











.0^ . 




r^^^^^v ,i^ .«, 




'f* «> ^ ' 



A 



<^. 











'^or 




^0 

















0' 




o 



-7> a\ N^ ' . . 5 .0 O 




*' ^^^'^ 
* -V V 





-o ^0 V, "^ .V 



.0- 











0" 



-j^m^^ ^. A-' .v^'. 




